Regions Strengthens Specialty Lending Team

Regions Financial (RF) in Birmingham continues to beef up its specialty lending capabilities, announcing Tuesday that it has hired three bankers to join its restaurant, healthcare and technology and defense banking groups. 

The $186 billion-aset company has been expanding its services for specialized industries, including transportation, restaurant, technology and defense, energy and healthcare, since 2008, focusing chiefly on middle-market companies. 

Robert Daniel, who previously worked at GE Capital Finance and Bank of America (BAC), will be group head and managing director of the restaurant banking group in Atlanta.   Greg Jones, who held leadership positions at Bank of America and Wells Fargo (WFC), has been named a managing director for the technology and defense banking group in Charlotte.

Chris Rogers will be a managing director of the healthcare banking group in Nashville, Tenn. He previously worked in healthcare investment banking positions with Morgan Keegan and Merrill Lynch, among other companies.  

“These industries are important growth engines for the U.S. economy, and companies in these sectors require financial products, services and expertise tailored to their specific needs in order to be successful,” John Barton, specialized industries executive at Regions Bank, said in a news release.

To go along with the new lenders, Regions has brought in three senior credit underwriters to support its specialized lending. Todd Rousseau has will work in the transportation banking group, Leo Bashinsky will work in the healthcare banking group and Aliya Willis will work in the restaurant banking group.

Regions is among several large regionals, including Huntington Bancshares (HBAN), BB&T (BBT) and KeyCorp (KEY), that have been targeting niche areas such as healthcare and energy to drive growth.