Thomas A Renyi headed up the Bank of New York for seven years betwen
1996 and 2003. So far, only one other Hungarian has reached similar
heights in the banking world: Péter Róna, who led the New York
subsidiary of the British investment bank Schroders from 1996 to 1991.
In Renyi's case, only his name betrays his origins, since even his
parents were born in the United States, and he himself speaks not a
word of Hungarian. But Róna, who was born in Miskolc in 1942 and
escaped with his father to Washington after the 1956 revolution, has
continuously nurtured links with the land of his birth since the
1970s, returning home after 1989.
Other emigré bankers have retained something of their Hungarianness.
Sándor Lámfalussy, 76, has lived in Belgium since 1949. He headed up
the Bank for International Settlements in Basel between 1985 and 1993,
followed by three years serving as chairman of the European Monetary
Institute. From 1999 to 2002 he led former PM Viktor Orbán's
consultative committee. György Szapáry left for Austria in 1956 at the
age of 18, eventually ending up in Belgium. He worked for almost a
quarter-century at the IMF, becoming vice-president of the Hungarian
National Bank after the regime change.
Many of these figures and their children sooner or later rediscovered
their former homeland and tried to 'give something back'. Many served
at the Hungarian National Bank. William de Gelsey, who left Hungary
for Britain following the Communist takeover in 1948, and who works
for Creditanstalt, represented Orion Bank, his then employer at the
50th aniversary of the Hungarian National Bank in 1974. "I was worried
that I'd never be able to return because my parents had escaped in
1948," he said. He relaxed when Mátyás Timár, then president of the
MNB gave him his word that he would not be singled out. But it was
still came as a surprise to Gelsey to be greeted at the airport as
'baron'. Orion helped with several bond issues in later years.
The Carter administration entrusted Róna with negotiations with the
MNB over the return of the Hungarian Crown in 1977. In exchange, the
US wanted various financial disputes between the two countries to be
settled, in particular concerning the payment of pre-war Hungarian
bonds.
