Shoji Mori, secretary general of the Financial Reconstruction Commission, will become the head of the Financial Services Agency on Jan. 6, succeeding Masaharu Hino, who will retire, government officials said Tuesday.
The government approved the appointment in a Cabinet meeting the same day.
Mori, 57, formerly a bureaucrat in the Finance Ministry, has been in his current post since the FRC was launched in 1998. On Jan. 6, the FRC will be disbanded and merged into the Cabinet Office, which will be launched the same day and with which the FSA will be affiliated.
FRC Chairman Hakuo Yanagisawa will continue to be state minister in charge of financial services after the government reorganization.
At a news conference after the Cabinet meeting, Yanagisawa said the FSA plans to set up a new advisory council after the FRC is disbanded.
The new panel, which will comprise Yanagisawa, Mori and four FRC commissioners, will advise the government on various issues concerning troubled financial institutions.