Ally Financial has tapped a veteran PNC Financial Services Group executive to serve as its next chief financial officer.
The $164 billion-asset company announced Tuesday that Jenn LaClair will join Ally as CFO-designate on Dec. 18 and will step into the role full-time on March 1. She will replace Chris Halmy, who is retiring after eight years with Detroit-based Ally.
LaClair, who is 46, held a variety of leadership roles in her 10 years with Pittsburgh-based PNC. She most recently headed up the business bank and before that served as CFO for all of the bank’s business lines. Before entering banking she was a consultant with McKinsey.
In a news release, Ally CEO Jeffrey Brown said that LaClair’s varied experience in financial services will help the company continue to evolve beyond its roots as an online bank and automobile lender. Over the past 18 months, Ally has acquired a wealth management firm and expanded into mortgage and credit card lending.
LaClair will report to Brown and will be based in Charlotte.
Halmy joined Ally in 2009 as the structured funding executive and became its CFO in 2013. He had previously held finance posts at Bank of America, MBNA America, Merrill Lynch, JPMorgan and the accounting firm Deloitte & Touche.
Halmy “has been a driving force in nearly every important and transformational initiative we’ve successfully undertaken — from funding the business during the height of the financial crisis to our initial public offering [in 2014] to our efforts to grow and diversify Ally with new lines of business and offerings,” Brown said in a news release. “I want to thank him for his contributions, service and leadership.”
