Carstens, 48, will help shape an economic agenda intended to boost growth, create jobs and eliminate poverty, Calderón said during a press conference in Mexico City. Carstens will leave his post at the IMF to join Calderón, according to an e-mailed press release from the Washington-based lender.

"The market by itself is not sufficient to create an economy that is truly human," Calderón said. "The sensibility and guidance of the state is needed to correct the terrible inequality that exists in our society - Dr. Carstens knows this."

The appointment makes Carstens a likely candidate to become finance secretary under Calderón, Chappell Lawson, a political science professor at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology in Cambridge, said in a telephone interview.

"He´s clearly a frontrunner, but these appointments don´t make it a sealed deal," Lawson said. "His name is good for the markets because people know him and trust him."

Carstens holds a doctorate in economics from the University of Chicago. From 2000 to 2003, he served as deputy finance secretary under Francisco Gil Díaz before taking the third-highest position at the IMF. He has worked as an economist for Mexico´s central bank.

"He´s known for being extremely competent," Gray Newman, chief Latin America economist with Morgan Stanley in New York, said in a telephone interview. "My sense is that he understands the public finances of Mexico probably as well as anybody."

Carstens, speaking beside Calderón today, said his experience working with underdeveloped economies in Africa, Asia and Central America gave him insight into solving Mexico´s problems.

"What Mexico needs is to foment economic growth and alleviate poverty," he said. "These should not be seen as separate goals."

Speaking to reporters on Oct. 4, Carstens praised Calderón´s agenda.

"I have to recognize that President-elect Calderón´s project is very interesting, it´s visionary, and I think Mexicans should support it," he told reporters at a banking conference in Mérida, Yucatan. During the interview, Carstens said social concerns including poverty were the country´s main challenges.