Regional Bank CRT Forum 2025

Chip is an Executive Director within Wells Fargo Securities Structured Products Group overseeing the Structured Solutions effort.  In this role, he focuses primarily on advising and consulting on capital and liquidity strategies using structured technology for banking clients.   He has over 20 years of structured funding experience with 13 years in Ally Financial’s treasury team. This experience included helping recently establish a new unsecured CLN platform, as well as executing on securitizations and loan sales.  Prior to Ally, Chip held roles in Structured Funding at Bank of America overseeing the largest US CRT program prior to Great Recession, as well as a position in the strategic capital and liquidity group in Wachovia’s treasury group.  He has a BS in accounting from Wake Forest University.

Darren King is a Senior Vice President in the Capital Markets Group at Merchants Capital, an affiliate of Merchants Bank of Indiana. He joined Merchants in 2022. In his role, Darren leads securitization activity for the bank, including SRT and Agency transactions backed by multifamily and healthcare commercial real estate debt. In addition, he works on Merchants’ 3rd party debt funds as part of the firm’s investment management business. Darren’s career spans over 20 years commercial real estate having previously held roles as a CMBS and CRE portfolio manager and credit specialist at hedge funds including Davidson Kempner, Semper Capital and Jerica Capital. He began his career and spent 10 years focused on CMBS trading and Capital Markets on the sell-side. Darren holds a BS in Computer Science from the University of Virginia.

Eric Andersson is leading iconicchain's operations for the German-speaking market, based in Frankfurt/Main. With over 20 years of comprehensive experience in the financial sector, Eric's expertise spans investment banking, consulting, and strategic leadership. Prior to joining iconicchain, he specialized in business development implementing global IT platforms, and driving the growth of fintech companies in regulated settings. Eric's professional journey across Europe's financial landscape is distinguished by his adaptability, having assumed a variety of roles including C-level executive positions, business development, project management, and business analysis.

Jeff K. Davis is the Managing Director of Mercer Capital’s Financial Institutions Group. The Financial Institutions Group works with banks, thrifts, asset managers, insurance companies and agencies, BDCs, REITs, broker-dealers and financial technology companies.

Prior to rejoining Mercer Capital, Davis spent 13 years as a sell-side analyst providing coverage of publicly traded banks and specialty finance companies to institutional investors evaluating common equity and fixed income investment opportunities. Jeff was most recently Managing Director of Guggenheim Securities, LLC, and was previously head of the Financial Institutions Group at FTN Equity Capital Markets. His work covering commercial banks was recognized for earnings accuracy and stock picking by Starmine/Forbes in 2005, 2007 and 2009, while his stock selection was ranked second for commercial banks in 2007 by the Wall Street Journal as part of its “Best on the Street” annual ranking of sell-side analysts. While at Mercer Capital in the 1990s, Jeff led the firm’s financial institutions practice, providing valuation and transaction advisory services.

Jeff is a speaker at industry gatherings, including SNL Financial/University of Virginia’s annual analyst training seminar, the ABA, various state banking meetings as well as security industry gatherings. Additionally, he regularly makes presentations to boards of directors and executive management teams. He is periodically quoted in the American Banker, Bloomberg News, and other media outlets. Presently, he is an editorial contributor to SNL Financial.

"Jeremy is a specialist in securitisation, more specifically in SRT, with over 17 years of expertise in derivatives trading, structuring, and regulatory engagement.

His career spans senior roles in major European banks and even a UK public-sector institution, and he has led structuring teams on SRT transactions across US, UK and EU asset classes. He is now a senior advisor at Alantra focusing on Credit Solutions for banks and NBFIs.

He has contributed to significant financial papers, such as "Rethinking the Securitisation Risk Weight Floor", where he explores innovative ways to reform the European regulatory landscape, specifically in securitisation risk assessment. His work, alongside other experts, advocates for a risk-sensitive approach to regulation, aiming to revitalise the European securitisation market by proposing new models for risk-weight calibration which are currently embedded in the EU Commission proposal to revive the EU securitisation framework.

By combining hands‑on structuring expertise with research and public speaking, Hermant continues to shape best practice in the securitisation sector."

Mr. Shemi is responsible for developing credit risk transfer solutions as well as the analytics that support further reinsurance market growth across asset classes largely uncorrelated to traditional property and casualty risk.   With more than 15 years of experience, he most recently served as Principal Advisor with the Federal Housing Finance Agency, leading several strategic initiatives related to the GSEs’ mortgage guarantee fee pricing, credit risk transfer, and capital planning. Prior to FHFA, he provided guidance to financial institutions and corporate creditor groups at investment bank Moelis & Co. and worked in global credit markets at private money management firm Christofferson, Robb & Co.

Amanda Baker is a results-driven attorney who represents issuers, borrowers, underwriters and
commercial banks in connection with the issuance of asset-backed bond offerings to help them
achieve their business goals. She specializes in securing financing for a diverse range of assets, including
small business and consumer fintech assets, auto loans, auto leases, trade receivables, residential
mortgages, and student loans. Amanda brings her strategic approach and deep understanding of assetbacked
financing to help clients navigate the public, 144A, and asset-backed commercial paper conduit
markets across the United States, Australia and Canada.
Amanda also represents fintech companies in various financings and routinely counsels clients regarding
regulatory developments and proposals.
Clients Amanda has served include Ally Bank, VW Credit Inc., Block, Inc., Square Financial Services, Inc.,
Upstart, Inc., Solar Mosaic, and Octane Lending, Inc.

Brian Gilbert is the corporate treasurer for Pinnacle Financial Partners. He is based at the firm’s downtown Nashville office at Pinnacle at Symphony Place.

Prior to joining the firm in 2004, Gilbert worked in public accounting as a financial institutions auditor at KraftCPAs beginning in 1999 and subsequently at Crowe Horwath.

He earned his bachelor’s degree in accounting from Tennessee Tech University and is a Chartered Financial Analyst

Gareth Old is a derivatives and structured finance lawyer in New York. His practice concentrates on risk management strategies for banks and financial investors, including cash and synthetic securitisations, derivatives and repo transactions, capital and regulatory advice. His clients include prominent fund and investment managers, banks, investors and service providers.

Prior to moving to New York in 2004, Gareth worked in Clifford Chance's offices in London, Hong Kong and Frankfurt.

Jalpesh Patel is Senior Director and Head of Capital Markets Funding at Ally Bank. In this role, he is responsible for leading Ally’s debt and equity capital markets activities, including the execution of secured and unsecured funding strategies, asset-backed securitizations, and credit risk transfer initiatives aimed at enhancing capital efficiency.

Over his long tenure at Ally, Mr. Patel has held leadership positions across multiple Treasury functions. His experience spans managing the enterprise  interest rate risk and derivatives hedging portfolio, structured product investment portfolio, and serving most recently as Head of the Enterprise Funding Desk.

James advises banks and the buy-side on a wide range of derivatives transactions in all the major asset classes, repos, securities lending, and structured notes. He also advises on a broad range of regulatory and strategic issues (e.g. benchmark reform and UST treasury clearing) across the derivatives and structured finance markets.

James advises issuers, investors and arrangers on CRT transactions and advised on SCI’s North American Transaction of the Year 2024 and various other North American CRT transactions.

James also advises numerous lenders in the insurance/funding agreement backed financing market.

James also advises clearinghouses on various matters, including the launch of new services and products, both in the US and UK.

JENNIFER BEARDEN is the Senior Director of the International Association of Credit Portfolio Managers (IACPM).   The IACM is a non-profit industry association dedicated to advancing the practice of credit portfolio management through advocacy, research, education, communication and promotion of sound practices.  The Association has grown enormously since its formation in 2001; IACPM members now total over 135 financial institutions around the globe.   In her role, Jennifer works with Som-lok Leung, IACPM Executive Director and Marcia Banks, Deputy Director to further the goals and objectives of the Association.  She is responsible for global regulatory advocacy.  Previously, Jennifer was a Director, Senior Trader at Bank of America Merrill Lynch for nine years.   She traded credit default swaps, corporate bonds and loans for the global loan portfolio group covering various industries.  Jennifer’s previous experience was as a Director at Bank One in the credit portfolio management group.   Jennifer holds an MBA from Kellogg Graduate School of Management at Northwestern and a BA in Economics, Markets and Management from Duke University. 

Joe is a Co-Leader of the Mortgage and Structured Credit segment at
Lockton Re. He has over six years of experience in reinsurance broking,
specializing in Mortgage and Structured Credit solutions, and spent the first
part of his career in investment management across multiple asset classes.
Prior to joining Lockton Re, Joe was a Senior Vice President at Guy Carpenter
on the Mortgage and Structured Credit team, joining the company after
completing his MBA at Cambridge University.

Joseph is the Head of US Regulatory
Policy, responsible for interpretation and
advocacy related to the Basel
Committee’s and the Federal Reserve’s
regulatory capital frameworks applicable to
the Bank Holding Company and to Goldman
Sachs Bank USA. He serves as co-chair of
the Finance, Risk and Services Asian
Professional Network.
Previously, Joseph helped create the
Regulatory Policy team in 2010. Prior to that,
he built the GS Bank USA Regulatory
Reporting team in 2008. Joseph joined
Goldman Sachs as an analyst in 2005 and
was named managing director in 2017.
Joseph earned a BBA in Accounting from
Baruch College in 2005 and an MBA in
Finance from New York University Stern
School of Business in 2011.

Karan is a Principal and the Head of RCR / Specialty Finance at Eagle Point Credit Management responsible for the firm’s investments in securitized transactions.

Karan has over 27 years of experience in sourcing and executing partnerships and lending facilities with banks and non-bank specialty lenders across various asset classes. Prior to joining Eagle Point in 2022, he was a Partner and Portfolio Manager at KLS Diversified Asset Management, where he spearheaded their investments across specialty finance and structured products. Before that, he was a part of the Structured Credit research and strategy team at Bear Stearns where he was a top ranked analyst in Institutional Investor’s All-America Fixed Income Research survey for his work in CLO and mortgage credit research. Karan started his career as an FX and Interest Rates trader at BNP Paribas in Mumbai.

Karan holds a BE from the Motilal Nehru National Institute of Technology Allahabad (MNNIT), an MBA from the Indian Institute of Management Ahmedabad (IIMA), and an MSc in Computational Finance from Carnegie Mellon University.

Mr. Kruzel is a senior vice president based in the New York office and a member of the capital markets team in PIMCO’s alternatives business management group. He focuses on originating investment opportunities and building relationships with PIMCO’s bank counterparties. Prior to joining PIMCO in 2022, Mr. Kruzel led the Americas bank solutions business at Citi, where he was responsible for the origination and structuring of bank capital transactions in the U.S., Canada, and Latin America. He also held roles in loan portfolio management in New York and franchise governance at Banamex in Mexico City. He has 10 years of investment experience and holds a master’s degree in international relations from American University, where he also earned two undergraduate degrees.

Mark van der Does is a Senior Broker within the Mortgage & Structured Credit segment at Lockton Re. He advises and represents banks and non-bank financial institutions that use credit insurance for credit risk distribution, capital management, and insurance-backed financing purposes. He has over twelve years of experience in the structured credit insurance industry, specializing in the placement and execution of credit insured financing transactions, and advising US regional banks on their internal approval process for using insurance as a loan syndications and exposure management tool. He holds an undergraduate degree from the University of Edinburgh. 

Richard Abizaid, Vice President and Senior Underwriter, joined MSIG USA July 2024.  Previously, he was with Vantage Risk Companies where he was also Vice President and Senior Underwriter.

Before Vantage Risk Companies, Richard worked at AXA XL (formerly XL Catlin) where he was the Head of the Americas for Political Risk, Credit, and Bond. In this capacity, he led a team of underwriters in New York; Washington, DC; Toronto; and Hamilton, Bermuda.

Prior to AXA XL, Richard worked at Zurich where he held several roles including, Assistant Vice President, Vice President & Deputy Regional Manager, Senior Vice President & Head of Asia, and Senior Vice President & Head of the Americas. He also spent significant time in Asia where he was based in Singapore for five years.

Richard also held several roles in the US government including Asia Country Manager at the US Trade and Development Agency (USTDA) and Director of the Political Risk Insurance Eurasia Team at the US Overseas Private Investment Corporation (OPIC), now known as the US International Development Finance Corporation (DFC).

Richard holds a Master of Arts degree in International Transactions from George Mason University in Fairfax, Virginia and a Bachelor of Arts degree in Near East Studies from the University of Arizona in Tucson.

Sagi Tamir concentrates his practice in the areas of structured finance and derivatives. Sagi is experienced in representing asset managers, initial purchasers, placement agents and issuers in a variety of securitization and other structured finance transactions. He has represented clients in numerous cash and synthetic collateralized bond, loan, fund and debt obligations transactions. Sagi also has extensive experience in workouts of CDO and CLO transactions. In the derivatives area, Sagi is working with credit default swaps and other derivative transactions.

Sagi is an Adjunct Professor of Law at New York University School of Law where he teaches a course titled “The Law of Securitization.”

Sandro Kraft is the Director, M&A at Valley and is responsible for overseeing all merger & acquisition and strategic partnership and business development initiatives of Valley.

Prior to joining Valley, Sandro was a Vice President in J.P. Morgan’s Financial Institutions Group in New York where he focused on originating and advising clients on M&A and debt & equity capital market transactions as well as other strategic projects for North American and European banks. He started his career in J.P. Morgan’s Financial Institutions Group in London as an Analyst.

Sandro holds a bachelor’s degree from the University of St.Gallen (HSG) where he studied Economics.

Ms. McGinty is a Partner in the Ares Credit Group, where she focuses on alternative credit investments as the Head of Capital Markets. Prior to joining Ares in 2023, Ms. McGinty was the Head of Partnerships & Business Development and Co-Head of Capital Markets at Theorem Partners.  Previously, she was an Executive Director at Morgan Stanley in London, where she was the Head of Syndication for the Secured Lending business. In addition, Ms. McGinty also held various roles in Credit Sales at Morgan Stanley and Bear Stearns, where she covered asset managers for corporate credit products in New York and London. She holds a B.S. from Villanova University in Finance and an M.A. from City, University of London in Investment Management.

Terry Lanson is a Managing Director at Seer Capital Management. He is responsible for the management of Seer’s investments in bank regulatory capital relief transactions, as well as other European investments. Seer has been an active investor in reg cap transactions across asset classes and jurisdictions since 2008. Mr Lanson joined Seer shortly after its inception in 2008 from Citigroup in London, where he spent two years. He spent the previous 9 years at Deutsche Bank in New York and London, where he was part of the team responsible for Deutsche’s market-leading balance sheet securitization/reg cap program. He worked on transactions including Haus, Core, Cast, Craft, Gate, and London Wall for Deutsche, as well as the first Start deal for Standard Chartered. He also structured and executed some of the first securitizations in the European markets for auto loans, trade receivables, and Pan-European corporate bonds. Mr Lanson holds an undergraduate degree from Harvard College.

Managing Member of TWK Advisors LLC

Thomas Killian is the Managing Member of TWK Advisors LLC, an advisory boutique specializing in advising investors and banking institutions considering strategic and regulatory capital strategies, balance sheet restructuring, and distressed bank acquisitions.

During his 45-year career in banking, including 32 years as a Partner and Managing Director at Sandler O’Neill and Piper Sandler, he completed over 58 transactions aggregating more than $20.5 billion in transaction value. Included among these transactions are 17 pooled trust preferred securitizations aggregating over $7 billion. He published more than 25 industry reports and comment letters covering complex regulatory and accounting considerations such as CECL, Basel III Endgame, TLAC and the Bank Merger Act that impact bank and non-bank financial institutions.

He advised numerous government agencies on significant large-scale projects for the U.S. Treasury and the FDIC. He has represented Sandler O’Neill and Piper Sandler in conferences and meetings with the Federal Financial Institutions Examinations Council, the Federal Reserve, and the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation to discuss bank capital structure, CECL, Dodd-Frank and Basel III related issues.

Mr. Killian holds a Bachelor of Science from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, where he was a John Motley Morehead Merit Scholar, and a Masters in Business Administration from Northwestern University’s J.L. Kellogg Graduate School of Management.

Jalpesh Patel is Senior Director and Head of Capital Markets Funding at Ally Bank. In this role, he is responsible for leading Ally’s debt and equity capital markets activities, including the execution of secured and unsecured funding strategies, asset-backed securitizations, and credit risk transfer initiatives aimed at enhancing capital efficiency.

Over his long tenure at Ally, Mr. Patel has held leadership positions across multiple Treasury functions. His experience spans managing the enterprise  interest rate risk and derivatives hedging portfolio, structured product investment portfolio, and serving most recently as Head of the Enterprise Funding Desk.

Chip is an Executive Director within Wells Fargo Securities Structured Products Group overseeing the Structured Solutions effort.  In this role, he focuses primarily on advising and consulting on capital and liquidity strategies using structured technology for banking clients.   He has over 20 years of structured funding experience with 13 years in Ally Financial’s treasury team. This experience included helping recently establish a new unsecured CLN platform, as well as executing on securitizations and loan sales.  Prior to Ally, Chip held roles in Structured Funding at Bank of America overseeing the largest US CRT program prior to Great Recession, as well as a position in the strategic capital and liquidity group in Wachovia’s treasury group.  He has a BS in accounting from Wake Forest University.

Daniel Esposito is a Vice President at RBC Capital Markets in the Financial Institutions DCM & Capital Advisory team. Dan has over 10 years of experience covering financial institutions with a primary focus on domestic banks and U.S. private credit vehicles. His responsibilities include regulatory advice & analysis, generating capital & liquidity solutions for regional bank and private credit issuers including SRTs (analytics, structuring and investor/issuer coverage). Within the financial institutions space, his specialties include structuring capital securities, optimizing rating agency metrics and capital structure optimization. Dan began his financial services career at the Federal Reserve Bank of New York within their Markets Group. Dan graduated from Rutgers Business School – New Brunswick with a degree in Finance and Economics.

James advises banks and the buy-side on a wide range of derivatives transactions in all the major asset classes, repos, securities lending, and structured notes. He also advises on a broad range of regulatory and strategic issues (e.g. benchmark reform and UST treasury clearing) across the derivatives and structured finance markets.

James advises issuers, investors and arrangers on CRT transactions and advised on SCI’s North American Transaction of the Year 2024 and various other North American CRT transactions.

James also advises numerous lenders in the insurance/funding agreement backed financing market.

James also advises clearinghouses on various matters, including the launch of new services and products, both in the US and UK.

Mr. Hinkle rejoined EJF in 2024 after previously working at the company from 2008 to 2016.  Prior to rejoining EJF, he founded and served as Managing Partner and Chief Investment Officer of Shoals Capital Management (“Shoals”), an alternative asset management firm that invested across the capital structure in the financial and real estate sectors.   Prior to Shoals, Mr. Hinkle served as the portfolio manager of EJF’s debt opportunities strategies from 2008 to 2016 and was a member of EJF’s Executive Committee.   Mr. Hinkle also served as an Associate Director at Navigant Consulting, where he was responsible for valuing distressed debt and equity investments in emerging economies for large multi-national corporations.   He also worked at FBR in the institutional equity research department as an analyst covering the life insurance sector.  Mr. Hinkle holds a degree in Economics from the College of William & Mary and is a Chartered Financial Analyst.

Joe is a Co-Leader of the Mortgage and Structured Credit segment at Lockton Re. He has over six years of experience in reinsurance broking, specializing in Mortgage and Structured Credit solutions, and spent the first part of his career in investment management across multiple asset classes. Prior to joining Lockton Re, Joe was a Senior Vice President at Guy Carpenter
on the Mortgage and Structured Credit team, joining the company after
completing his MBA at Cambridge University.

Sandro Kraft is the Director, M&A at Valley and is responsible for overseeing all merger & acquisition and strategic partnership and business development initiatives of Valley.

Prior to joining Valley, Sandro was a Vice President in J.P. Morgan’s Financial Institutions Group in New York where he focused on originating and advising clients on M&A and debt & equity capital market transactions as well as other strategic projects for North American and European banks. He started his career in J.P. Morgan’s Financial Institutions Group in London as an Analyst.

Sandro holds a bachelor’s degree from the University of St.Gallen (HSG) where he studied Economics.

Sean Hannah has been a vital part of the Lockton Re team since 2020. As a credentialed actuary and broker, he has been pivotal in the development of Lockton Re’s analytics platform as well as its deployment to better serve clients and markets. Prior to Lockton Re, Sean was at Willis Re where he led the build out of their global Mortgage and Structured Credit analytics capability.

Terry Lanson is a Managing Director at Seer Capital Management. He is responsible for the management of Seer’s investments in bank regulatory capital relief transactions, as well as other European investments. Seer has been an active investor in reg cap transactions across asset classes and jurisdictions since 2008. Mr Lanson joined Seer shortly after its inception in 2008 from Citigroup in London, where he spent two years. He spent the previous 9 years at Deutsche Bank in New York and London, where he was part of the team responsible for Deutsche’s market-leading balance sheet securitization/reg cap program. He worked on transactions including Haus, Core, Cast, Craft, Gate, and London Wall for Deutsche, as well as the first Start deal for Standard Chartered. He also structured and executed some of the first securitizations in the European markets for auto loans, trade receivables, and Pan-European corporate bonds. Mr Lanson holds an undergraduate degree from Harvard College.

Mr. Kruzel is a senior vice president based in the New York office and a member of the capital markets team in PIMCO’s alternatives business management group. He focuses on originating investment opportunities and building relationships with PIMCO’s bank counterparties. Prior to joining PIMCO in 2022, Mr. Kruzel led the Americas bank solutions business at Citi, where he was responsible for the origination and structuring of bank capital transactions in the U.S., Canada, and Latin America. He also held roles in loan portfolio management in New York and franchise governance at Banamex in Mexico City. He has 10 years of investment experience and holds a master’s degree in international relations from American University, where he also earned two undergraduate degrees.