Mike is also regularly appointed as a Chief Restructuring Officer and as a Director on the Board of companies in distress.
Mike began his career with Barclays Bank and after 10 years, he moved to Standard Bank to take up the position of Deputy Head of Credit in London. In his 18 years with Standard Bank, Mike held a number of senior positions in the Risk Department, leading teams focussed on portfolio management, restructuring and recovery. From 2006 to 2012 Mike was Standard Banks Global Head for Restructuring and Recovery managing teams across Africa, Asia, Latin America and Europe.
Subsequently at Standard Chartered Bank, Mike was Group Special Asset Management (GSAM) Head, Europe and Americas Region - with a portfolio in excess of US$3 billion - and Global Head Structured Solutions and Advisory, tasked with finding market-based solutions for large corporate clients in distress.
Mike has held a board position in an African-based infrastructure fund and has also represented creditor’s interests on boards of private companies as part of distressed restructurings.
Mike is an Associate of the Chartered Institute of Bankers and a Member of the Institute for Turnaround.
Professional Affiliations and Academic Qualifications
- Associate of the Chartered Institute of Bankers
- Member of the Institute for Turnaround
Professional Experience
- Assisted a large West African Bank in managing their defaulted loans originated by their UK operation. This involved taking lead roles in several loans to West African borrowers, mainly in the oil and gas sector and managing a large credit insurance claim.
- Chief Restructuring Officer to a Ghanaian steel company with the aim of restructuring their bank facilities to match their revised business plan. The lenders were all Ghanaian and exceeded 10 institutions.
- Assisting an African Bank in a number of defaulted loan situations mainly located in Nigeria, Ghana and Kenya.
- Assisting a UK bank in their recovery strategy for a multi banked Ivorian commodity company that had been placed into liquidation and establishing and executing a recovery plan for an international trading company.
- Portfolio review of an international bank’s corporate NPL book and the early alert (watchlist) book. This was very well received by Senior Management, Auditors and Regulators and continued as an ongoing process under my management.
- Managed several distressed / turnaround situations in the Oil and Gas services, shipping, construction, mining, manufacturing, Diamond and Jewellery and soft commodity producers across Africa, Europe and the Americas.
- Managed the exit of a loan portfolio in excess of USD2 billion to the Diamond and Jewellery sector in Europe. This portfolio was across 17 borrowing groups and involved litigation and recovery action against several of the borrowers. An exit plan, with all clients, was agreed and implemented.
- Recovery of a defaulted structured warehouse trade facility in Southern Africa where a large portion of collateral has been stolen. This initially involved securing and managing the sale of the remaining stock, via the borrower with 3rd party monitors actively involved.
- Restructuring of a project finance transaction to mining transactions in Sierra Leone.
