OakNorth Bank appoints CFO

By Bridging Loan Directory 25th August 2020

OakNorth Bank – the UK bank powered by OakNorth – today announces the appointment of Rajesh Gupta as CFO, who will be joining the bank pending regulatory approval.

Rajesh joins from Kensington Mortgages, a leading specialist non-bank mortgage lender in the UK where he spent five and a half years as CFO, overseeing the finance function during a period of significant transformation and growth.

Prior to Kensington, he had a 21-year career with General Electric where he held various positions including: CFO of GE Capital Bank UK (c.$5bn of assets), CFO for GE Money Bank in the Czech Republic (c.$7bn of assets) and Head of Financial Planning and Analysis for the EMEA Region (c. $50bn of assets).

Rajesh takes over from Cristina Alba Ochoa who joined the Bank as its CFO in April 2017 and after a successful journey with OakNorth, is moving to Barcelona to be closer to family.

Cristina will remain CFO until Rajesh joins and will continue at OakNorth indefinitely, albeit in a different role.

Launched in September 2015, OakNorth Bank has grown into an international success story, achieving performance metrics that place it amongst the top 1% of banks in the developed world – an ROE run-rate of 23%, an efficiency ratio run-rate of 26%, an NPS of 80.5, and pre-tax profits that increased 95% in 2019 to £65.9m.

As CFO, Rajesh will help ensure the Bank can maintain this impressive track record through the COVID-19 recovery and beyond.

Rishi Khosla, CEO and co-founder of OakNorth Bank, said:

“Rajesh has a wealth of CFO experience, leading institutions with assets up to 10 times that of OakNorth Bank.

In the five years since we launched, OakNorth Bank has lent over £4.5bn to hundreds of businesses across the UK, directly contributing to the creation of tens of thousands of new homes and jobs across the country.

However, we aim to have a much larger impact in the years to come, so it is essential that we continue strengthening our leadership team.

We’re excited to have Rajesh on board and look forward to welcoming him in the coming months.”

Rajesh Gupta continued:

“I’ve been following OakNorth’s Bank’s incredible growth story for the last few years, so am excited to now be a part of it and be joining at such a seminal moment for both the company and the country.

In a relatively short time, OakNorth Bank has grown into what is arguably the most successful new bank in the UK and the fastest-growing businesses in Europe.

I have been very impressed by the passion and energy of the people I have met at OakNorth – this is a great strength.

Rishi and Joel established the bank to provide financing to the underserved sectors of the SME space and in the wake of the COVID pandemic, this proposition is now all the more critical.”