The economist Ion Lapedatu, governor of the National Bank of Romania, was part of the generation that helped forge Greater Romania’s destiny. It was his merit to have raised the economic standards of the Romanian state during the inter-war period. In his capacity as Secretary General of the Ministry of Finance within the Ruling Council (Consiliul Dirigent), Lapedatu laid the groundwork for “a better and brighter future” for the Romanian people and proposed important draft laws to support the economic consolidation of the Romanian State. After his mandate as Minister of Public Finance between 1926 - 1927, in 1928 he started working for the National Bank of Romania, where he was in turn a manager, deputy governor and eventually a governor between 1944 - 1945, in a difficult political context marred by World War Two conflicts and instability.

Minutes of 6 March 1928 showing
Ioan Lapedatu’s interim appointment as
director within the National Bank (NBR Archives, Boards, File 192/1926)
 

Ion Lapedatu was born on 14 September 1876 in Transylvania, in the village of Cernatu, Săcele commune, Brașov county, which was back then part of Austria-Hungary. He attended the High Commercial School in Brașov, from which he graduated “with distinction” and subsequently he enrolled in the Faculty of Law and Political Sciences within the University of Budapest. At the same time, Ion Lapedatu attended the classes of the Economic School which prepared future teachers for commercial schools.

His professional and political activity reveals a multi-faceted personality; he stood out as both an expert in economic and financial matters and a famous politician who participated in Romania’s political life in the inter-war period.

In his capacity as member of the Romanian National Party, on 1 December 1918, upon Transylvania joining Romania, Ion Lapedatu took part in the National Assembly in Alba Iulia alongside other notable politicians such as Iuliu Maniu, Al. Vaida-Voevod, Vasile Goldiș, etc. As a matter of fact, one day before the Great Union was achieved, the Romanian economist wrote in Revista Economică ( Economic Magazine) that “this release from political slavery” would also bring about the Romanian people’s “release from economic slavery”, giving them the possibility to “develop freely”, in accordance with their capacities, “and build a better and brighter future”.

In the following period, Ion Lapedatu reached the pinnacle of his career, as he had the opportunity to turn to good account the banking and financial expertise he had gained during the mandates he had held, inter alia at the NBR. It was his chance to help address the problems facing Romania at that time.

Minutes of 26 March 1928 showing for the first time
the signature of Ioan Lapedatu in his capacity as member of
the NBR’s General Board (NBR Archives, Boards, File 202/1928)

In March 1926, Ion Lapedatu was appointed director at the National Bank of Romania, but his mandate was put on hold given the overlapping with his designation as Minister of Finance. Two years later, the economist returned to the NBR and was appointed director by the vote of the General Assembly of Shareholders. In 1929, the NBR Statutes were amended and the former directors became managers. Re-elected manager at the NBR by the shareholders for the 1932-1936 period, Lapedatu served as a member of the NBR’s Executive Board. After this mandate, he was twice re-elected as manager and thereafter he came to occupy the position of deputy governor during World War Two.

Minutes of the first meeting of
the NBR’s General Board, run by Ion Lapedatu
in his capacity as governor (NBR Archives, Boards, File 330/1941)

In those trying times for the Romanian people, Ion Lapedatu took an active part in:

• supporting the country’s war efforts through loans granted to the government;
• financing the war via enhancing production in the agricultural and industrial sectors;
• disbanding or temporarily relocating 24 of the NBR branches, in the aftermath of the territorial losses in the summer of 1940;
• bailing out North Transylvania-based Romanian commercial banks.

In his capacity as deputy governor, Lapedatu was behind all the decisions relative to the relocation of the banks’ services, the NBR’s numismatic collection, the painting collection and especially the gold stock, which, at the end of May 1944, found shelter at Tismana Monastery, and thus managed to escape plunderers.

Ioan Lapedatu, alongside Governor Mitiță Constantinescu
and central bank governors from Czechoslovakia and Yugoslavia,
during their meeting in Bucharest
in September 1937 (The Dimineața newspaper, 1 October 1937)

On 30 September 1944, Ion Lapedatu was appointed governor of the National Bank of Romania in an intricate political and economic context. His mandate at the NBR’s helm saw: further support of the country’s war efforts, the fulfilment of the obligations arising from the Armistice Convention (Romania signed with the Allied Powers and the Central Powers in Moscow), the withdrawal from circulation of the money issued by the Soviet Army, the increase in money circulation and the leu devaluation. Following the coming to power of the Petru Groza government, Ion Lapedatu had to resign from the governor position on 14 March 1945, but he continued to serve the bank as manager until 1 January 1947.

The last years of his life, Ion Lapedatu grieved for the loss of his brother Alexandru who demised in 1950 in the prison of Sighet and had to deal with the material and moral persecutions he was subjected to by the communist regime. He passed away on 24 March 1951.