Tierney Steps Aside as Flagstar's CEO

Flagstar Bancorp (FBC) in Troy, Mich., announced that its chief executive has stepped aside after just eight months in the post.

The $13.1 billion-asset company said Friday it Allesandro DiNello had succeeded Michael Tierney, effective immediately. DiNello had been the president and chief administrative officer of Flagstar's bank since March. Tierney, who became the company's CEO is October, has returned to his role as the bank's head of personal financial services.

Under Tierney, Flagstar had worked to reinvent itself as a Michigan community bank with a national mortgage business, while continuing to put behind it litigation and nonperforming loans tied to the financial crisis. Flagstar recently agreed to pay $110 million to settle charges by bond insurer MBIA that Flagstar misrepresented the quality of more than $1 billion of private label mortgage-backed securities it sold to investors.

In December, Tierney told American Banker that Flagstar was "working hard to reduce or eliminate uncertainty regarding" its past issues. "While we've made great progress there, we still need to continue to push on that as we go through 2013," he said at that time.

Tierney "has worked hard to position Flagstar as a top-tier national mortgage originator and a strong Michigan community bank, and we are pleased that he will remain a valuable member of the executive team," John Lewis, the company's chairman, said in a press release.

DiNello "has deep roots in Michigan and a thorough understanding of our markets and consumers," Lewis added. "The board is confident that he is the right person to lead Flagstar going forward."

DiNello has served in a variety of posts at Flagstar since joining the company in 1994. As president, he supervised commercial banking, personal financial services and technology, as well as Flagstar's effort to meet the requirements of a regulatory order to detail capital, liquidity and risk-management plans.

Separately, Flagstar said it had hired Lee Smith as its chief operating officer. Smith had previously worked at MatlinPatterson Global Advisers, a New York private-equity firm that is also Flagstar's largest shareholder. Smith, who joined MatlinPatterson in 2010, had also held posts at Zolfo Cooper, an investment advisory firm, and Ernst & Young.