David Lipton

Biographical Information

July 2, 2019

Mr. David Lipton assumed the position of First Deputy Managing Director of the International Monetary Fund on September 1, 2011. On March 28, 2016, Mr. Lipton was reappointed for a second five-year term beginning September 1, 2016.

Before coming to the Fund, Mr. Lipton was Special Assistant to the President, and served as Senior Director for International Economic Affairs at the National Economic Council and National Security Council at the White House.

Previously, Lipton was a Managing Director at Citi, where he was Head of Global Country Risk Management. In that capacity, he chaired Citi’s Country Risk Committee, worked for the Senior Risk Officer, and advised senior management on global risk issues.

Prior to joining Citi in May 2005, he spent five years at Moore Capital Management, a global hedge fund and, before that, a year at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace.

Lipton served in the Clinton administration at the Treasury Department from 1993 to 1998. As Under Secretary of the Treasury for International Affairs — and before that as Assistant Secretary – Lipton helped lead the Treasury’s response to the financial crisis in Asia and the effort to modernize the international financial architecture.

Before joining the Clinton administration, Lipton was a fellow at the Woodrow Wilson Center of Scholars.

From 1989 to 1992, he teamed up with Prof. Jeffrey Sachs then at Harvard University, working as economic advisers to the governments of Russia, Poland and Slovenia during their transitions to capitalism.

Lipton began his career with eight years on the staff of the International Monetary Fund, working on economic stabilization issues in emerging market and poor countries.

Lipton earned a Ph.d. and M.A. from Harvard University in 1982 and a B.A. from Wesleyan University in 1975.

He is married to Susan Galbraith and has three children, Anna, Sasha, and Gabriel.