Challenger bank Oaknorth expands its team with three key hires
It's only a few days into 2017, but Oaknorth has already further expanded its team, making three key hires.
Morning Wire has learnt that the challenger bank has appointed Georgy Naydenov and Stuart Blair as debt finance directors, and David Webley joins as a credit director.
Industry veteran Webley has previously spent 25 years at Barclays and was most recently credit partner at Santander.
Meanwhile, Blair joins the team from RBS vehicle Williams & Glyn, while Naydenov has previously worked at NIBC Bank and PwC.
Oaknorth's headcount now stands at 110, and it is planning to make further hires throughout the year.
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Oaknorth's debt finance team lead Ben Barbanel said:
We have built our lending team around this proposition, recruiting only those who share our entrepreneurial drive, ambition, and belief that the current system isn’t working for entrepreneurs and can be massively improved.
Georgy, Stuart and David all meet these criteria down to a tee and bring a wealth of experience to the team that will help us achieve our ambitious goals for 2017.
The bank, which formally launched in September 2015, has already grown its loan book to £300m and managed to break even after 11 months of trading. Undeterred by June's Brexit vote, the challenger also has £500m of deals currently in its pipeline, which it has calculated will result in a further £2bn being added to the economy next year.