WASHINGTON : Bank Negara governor Tan Sri Dr Zeti Akhtar Aziz got an “A” for the fifth year in a row in an annual financial report card of bank governors from around the world issued by Global Finance magazine. 

“Malaysia seems to have successfully weathered this year's global and regional financial turmoil, and as usual central banker Zeti's even-handed management of monetary policy has helped,” the US-based magazine said in its October issue. 

“Unfazed by both the Asian crisis early this year and the spillover from the US subprime crisis, Zeti has kept interest rates steady at 3.5% since last April,” it said. “By effectively doing nothing for the past year or so, the central bank has been extremely effective,” it added. 

In an interview with Bernama here, Zeti said: “I would call it a pause. We were one of the first to leave our (interest) rates unchanged when everybody was raising rates. I saw signs of slower growth and no threat of inflation, so decided to pause.” 

Only six central bank governors received “A's”. The others are from the Philippines, Indonesia, India, Sweden, Israel and Taiwan .