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BNK has welcomed John Kolenda as a director of the company to help drive the “next stage of growth”.
BNK Banking Corporation Limited (ASX: BBC) has appointed MA Financial’s managing director strategy & growth John Kolenda, the former chief executive and founder of Finsure, as a board member of the company.
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It comes after BNK sold the aggregation group Finsure to MA Financial Group for $152.2 million in January 2022.
The acquisition saw Mr Kolenda’s appointment as MA Financial’s managing director strategy & growth — lending, leave his role as Finsure CEO.
Given Mr Kolenda’s extensive experience in the mortgage broking and aggregation sector and prior knowledge of BNK, BNK chair Don Koch he was “confident” Mr Kolenda would assist in “driving the next stage”.
“We continue to implement our shift in strategic direction to focus on higher value commercial products,” Mr Koch said.
“I am confident that his extensive experience in the mortgage sector will assist in driving the next stage for the company.”
Speaking on his appointment, Mr Kolenda said: “I’m pleased to be appointed to the Board of BNK and look forward to working alongside the experienced team to create further shareholder value.”
Mr Kolenda has also held former roles as the general manager of sales and distribution at Aussie Home Loans for 10 years from 1994, before founding X Inc, a mortgage originator before its merger with the mortgage broking operations of Ray White in 2007.
He also founded several businesses before launching the Finsure group in 2011, and co-founded and chairs Aura Group, a boutique corporate adviser and investment house.
BNK launches into SME lending
As part of its financial year results 2022, the company announced plans to pivot into “higher margin” commercial lending.
It reported strong mortgage growth of $984 million, which was up from $537 million last year (FY21) and $285 million in FY20 — an increase of 86 per cent.
CEO Allan Savins said building on its “excellent growth” across its loan book, it plans to diversify into commercial lending and tap into the growing opportunity in Australia.
“Building on this success, our plan is to achieve 15–20 per cent commercial secured settlements of our total volume projections for FY23,” Mr Savins said.
In addition to optimising the usage of its prime warehouse for residential lending to manage capital and its longer-term strategy of “building a $3 billion loan book”.
The group received a net profit after tax of $59.8 million, compared to $5.6 million the year before, marking a 956.5 per cent increase, which was primarily driven by the sale of Finsure.
[Related: BNK launches into SME lending, its FY22 results reveal]
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