LISBON, Sept. 18 (Xinhua) -- Portuguese Prime Minister Antonio Costa is backing Finance Minister Mario Centeno to be the next president of Eurogroup, according to Portuguese media reports on Monday.
Speculation has been growing in recent weeks that Centeno could take over from Jeroen Dijsselbloem at the helm of Eurogroup, the body that brings together the 19 finance ministers of the members in the eurozone.
Dijsselbloem is expected to lose his job as finance minister in the next Dutch government with coalition negotiations currently under way, with his party having fared badly in the March elections.
Centeno has repeatedly refused to rule himself out of the running for the Eurogroup hotseat and it seems he now has prime minister's backing. When asked in a weekend interview by local media whether he would recommend Centeno for the role, Costa said "Why not put a candidate forward?"
Centeno, who has been described as the Ronaldo of European finance by German Finance Minister Wolfgang Schauble, is riding high following Portugal's exit from the excessive deficit procedure in May and its return to investment grade status on Friday, with the Standard & Poor's agency having lifted Portuguese debt out of the junk bracket.
