Jer Wood, former President of Hatch Bank, has joined the LoanPro executive team as the President of Credit Sponsorship, using his background in bank sponsorship to help reimagine how sponsor banks, fintechs, and credit platforms can work together.
LoanPro, the API-first, modern lending and credit platform, announced today that Jer Wood has joined their executive team as the President of Credit Sponsorship, launching an initiative to reinvent direct credit sponsorship partnerships for banks and their fintech partners.
Jer brings twenty years of experience in banking, most recently as the President of Hatch Bank for six years, where he directed the transformation of the bank to a digital-first fintech sponsor bank. Jer has also held foundational leadership positions with several other sponsor banks, including Celtic Bank, Axos Bank, and others. In addition to fintech sponsorship, Jer has deep experience in the banking industry, including portfolio management, pricing, compliance, and wide-scale digital banking and digital transformation projects.
In 2024, sponsor banks are reevaluating the way in which they partner with fintechs. Early “connector” offerings promised a win-win for sponsor banks, fintechs, and end customers, but concerns have skyrocketed over compliance and visibility of data for sponsor banks. In 2023, there was a 139% increase in sponsor banks receiving formal enforcement actions. Furthermore, both the FDIC and CFPB have suggested increased focus on compliance for bank-fintech partnerships.
Over the past several months, industry experts such as Simon Taylor, Ron Shevlin, Jason Mikula, and others have emphasized a need to reinvent the sponsor bank and banking as a service model. We believe the future involves a much closer relationship and alignment between sponsor banks and fintechs. That way, sponsor banks can more closely monitor and ensure compliance. However, sponsor banks need to provide fintechs with a technology platform that also enables their fintech partners to be nimble and drive innovation. Jer has joined LoanPro to provide sponsor banks with this technology platform to balance compliance with innovation for credit programs that they launch with fintech partners.
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