Career moves

SG Corporate and Investment Banking, a subsidiary of French Bank Societe Generale, has created a U.S. mortgage-backed securities group and hired U.S. industry veterans to launch the business."The new initiative allows SG CIB to develop U.S. RMBS capital market capabilities to complement its existing RMBS businesses in Europe and Australia," the company said. "The move also enhances SG CIB's global structuring and distribution capacity to help issuers tap the U.S. or European markets." The following MBS professionals have joined the new unit as directors: David Chang, who previously traded seasoned and distressed mortgage credits at Deutsche Bank; Abner Figueroa, who worked for Eurohypo AG; Carole Mortensen, who worked for UBS; Rob Pak, who was part of SG CIB's collateralized debt obligation group; and Graham Henley, who was responsible for the residential mortgage warehouse program at Garban-Intercapital. Yuan Zhou, who previously worked for C-BASS, has also joined the SG CIB unit and has been named a vice president.

ComUnity Lending, Morgan Hill, Calif., has announced the formation of a new Executive Leadership Team with the promotions of Jayson Stebbins and Janene Towner to executive vice president.The mortgage lender said the pair will join company president and chief executive officer Darryl Fry on the three-person executive team, which will oversee the company's strategic initiatives and planning, including its "aggressive" expansion efforts. Mr. Stebbins has been senior vice president of production for several years, and Ms. Towner was most recently senior vice president and chief operating officer. The company said the move was prompted by its "stunning growth over the past few years and opportunities created by several new ventures." ComUnity Lending said it now has more than 1,300 full-time employees in 40 licensed states. The company can be found online at http://www.communitylending.com.

Former Fannie Mae chairman and chief executive Franklin Raines, who was forced into retirement in December, is serving as adviser to Revolution LLC, a new Washington-based venture capital firm founded by ex-America Online chairman Steve Case.According to a report in the Washington Post, Mr. Raines is serving as an unpaid "informal" adviser to Revolution. The former Fannie Mae CEO, who keeps an office at Revolution, did not return a telephone call by MortgageWire's deadline. Mr. Raines, a former AOL director, is a general partner in the Washington Baseball Club, which is trying to purchase the Nationals. The WBC continues to list him as Fannie's chairman and CEO even though he has not worked there in six months. Fannie Mae, meanwhile, is expected to restate earnings by $9 billion to $12 billion, and its accounting practices are under investigation by several federal agencies, including the Justice Department.

Susan Barnes has been named practice leader and head of the Standard & Poor's Structured Finance Residential Mortgage group in North America.Ms. Barnes, previously the senior analytical manager of the residential mortgage group, will manage all of S&P's U.S. residential mortgage-backed securities activities, products, and analysts, the rating agency said. Before joining S&P in 1993, she worked at Citicorp Securities Markets and was previously employed at mortgage companies in both the primary and secondary markets. S&P said Ms. Barnes' activities in recent years included the development of "market-leading RMBS criteria related to anti-predatory-lending laws." S&P Ratings Services can be found on the Web at http://www.standardandpoors.com.

Brenda Arnold has been named senior process and project manager at Portellus Inc., Irvine, Calif., where she will manage the installation of the company's mortgage-related technology products for lenders nationwide.Ms. Arnold was most recently employed by Irvine-based Commerce Velocity Inc., where she managed teams of developers, business analysts, and quality assurance specialists on various projects. Portellus, which specializes in the application of service-oriented architecture for the mortgage banking and insurance industries, said she will be responsible for implementing projects involving the company's business rules management system, automated underwriting system, product and pricing eligibility, Web-based mortgage broker portal system, and loan origination system. Portellus can be found online at http://www.portellus.com.

Chase D. Fonteno has been named president and chief executive officer of Hilton Head Properties Inc., a Dallas-based real estate investment firm.Hilton Head said Mr. Fonteno has over 25 years' experience in real estate investment and management, including an "extensive background" in affordable housing initiatives and multifamily project financing and redevelopment. The company, which specializes in the acquisition and owner-financed sale of single-family residential housing and long-term investment in multifamily projects, can be found on the Web at http://www.hiltonheadproperties.net.

Charles K. Barbo, chairman and chief executive officer of Shurgard Storage Centers Inc., a Seattle-based real estate investment trust, has announced that he will step down as CEO at the end of the year but retain his title as chairman.Mr. Barbo, the founder of Shurgard, will be succeeded as CEO by David K. Grant, the REIT's president and chief operating officer. Mr. Grant will hold the titles of president and CEO when he steps into his new role on Jan. 1, 2006. Mr. Grant was Shurgard's European president from 1996 to 2003.

Starwood Hotels & Resorts Worldwide Inc., White Plains, N.Y., has announced that its founder, Barry S. Sternlicht, will resign his post as executive chairman of the company to devote more time to his real estate investment and private equity firm, Starwood Capital.Mr. Sternlicht, who retired as chief executive officer last year after leading a search to identify his successor, will also resign from the Starwood Hotels board and assume the title of founder and chairman emeritus. "Eighteen months ago, I made the decision to reduce my involvement in the company to spend more time with my family and focus on my other business interests," Mr. Sternlicht said. Starwood also announced that Lizanne Galbreath has been elected a director to fill the vacancy created by Mr. Sternlicht's resignation from the board, and that Bruce W. Duncan has been elected chairman of the board. The company can be found online at http://www.starwoodhotels.com.

Jeff Hyde has been named a managing director in the Fixed Income Group of Sandler O'Neill & Partners LP, a New York-based investment banking firm, where he will focus on trading mortgage pass-throughs for the firm's clients.Mr. Hyde, 38, was most recently a managing director at The Advest Group, Sandler O'Neill said. Before that, he spent 12 years at Prudential Securities. Sandler O'Neill can be found on the Web at http://www.sandleroneill.com.

Michael A. Benoit has been named executive vice president and chief legal officer of Mavent Inc., an Irvine, Calif.-based provider of automated compliance systems for the financial services industry.The company said Mr. Benoit will lead its contract management efforts and assist in the management of the Mavent Legal Network, a group of more than 40 law firms that assist Mavent in maintaining and interpreting regulatory law. Mr. Benoit formerly worked for Hudson Cook LLP, a financial services law firm based in Linthicum, Md., where he assisted banks, credit unions, mortgage bankers, and others in developing consumer finance programs. Mavent can be found online at http://www.mavent.com.

Gail P. Seneca, chairman and chief executive officer of Luminent Mortgage Capital, has announced that she will leave her position as CEO of Seneca Capital Management by the end of the year to focus exclusively on Luminent."Luminent is evaluating [the possibility of] expanding its mortgage platform beyond the agency-spread arbitrage sector of the mortgage-backed securities market," Ms. Seneca said. "We appointed a highly experienced mortgage finance professional as president in March 2005. Today's announcement continues the momentum at Luminent to expand and improve our business model and results." The company can be found on the Web at http://www.luminentcapital.com.

Maria Fregosi has been promoted to the executive committee of ABN Amro Mortgage Group, Ann Arbor, Mich., where she will assume responsibility for AAMG's pricing strategies and secondary marketing activities.Ms. Fregosi will also continue to oversee AAMG's capital markets division, AMCAP. "The integration of capital markets, secondary markets, and pricing strategies enables AAMG to tightly link its front-end pricing with its investor activities," said company chairman and chief executive officer Thomas M. Goldstein. Ms. Fregosi served most recently as group senior vice president for the AMCAP division and was responsible for the development of its ABN Amro mortgage conduit program, master servicing group, and commercial mortgage securitization program, the company said.

Eric Spence has been named executive vice president of national production, prime lending, at Countrywide Financial Corp., Calabasas, Calif.Mr. Spence will be responsible for the production and market share growth of the Wholesale Lending Division, the company said. A 19-year veteran of the mortgage industry, Mr. Spence was most recently EVP for the western division of Countrywide's wholesale branch system. He was previously EVP of production at Washington Mutual. Mr. Spence was also senior vice president for WaMu's Wholesale Lending Division, and was SVP of wholesale lending for American Savings Bank before it was acquired by WaMu. "Eric's promotion brings greater collaboration and synchronization across the wholesale lending channel, with the West, Central, and East divisions now operating their sales efforts under the guidance of a single executive," said Brian Robinett, managing director of prime lending for Countrywide wholesale lending. Countrywide can be found online at http://www.countrywide.com.

Mortgage banking veteran Bill Steinmetz has been hired to lead the Wholesale Production Operations group of Washington Mutual Inc., Seattle.Mr. Steinmetz, 44, will assume the new post on May 2 and will oversee WaMu's national network of wholesale loan fulfillment centers, the company said. He will be located in Jacksonville, Fla., and will report to Wayne Pollack, the company's division executive of home loans production operations. Mr. Steinmetz, who has more than 20 years of experience in the mortgage industry, previously served as senior vice president of business-to-business operations for Chase Home Finance, where he managed the company's wholesale and correspondent operations, B2B pricing, and registration and operations support, WaMu said.

Steven M. Abreu has been named president and chief executive officer of GreenPoint Mortgage, a wholly owned subsidiary of North Fork Bancorp., Melville, N.Y.Mr. Abreu succeeds S. A. Ibrahim, who was recently named to take over as CEO of Radian Group Inc., a Philadelphia-based mortgage insurer, from the retiring Frank Filipps. Mr. Abreu has held numerous management posts at GreenPoint and its predecessor since 1988, most recently as an executive vice president responsible for production, sales, secondary marketing, investor relations, and new business.

F. Scott Kellman has been named senior vice president for business development at Health Care Property Investors Inc., a real estate investment trust based in Long Beach, Calif.The REIT said the appointment is effective June 1. Mr. Kellman is currently treasurer and senior vice president for corporate finance and real estate at Tenet Healthcare Corp., a for-profit operator of acute care hospitals. He was previously chief operating officer of Omega Healthcare Investors Inc., a health care REIT. Before that, he founded a health care REIT that merged with Omega. Health Care Property Investors can be found online at http://www.hcpi.com.

Julie Joseforsky has been named president of Key Mortgage Services, a component of Cleveland-based KeyBank's consumer finance unit, and Marc Rittenhouse has been named president of Secolink Settlement Services, a unit of Key Mortgage.Ms. Joseforsky was most recently the chief administrative officer of Key Consumer Finance. She previously held positions as director of direct lending and director of compliance for Household International, KeyBank said. Mr. Rittenhouse was most recently senior vice president of operations for ATM Corp. of America. KeyBank's parent company, KeyCorp, can be found on the Web at http://www.key.com.

Eric B. Dana has been named senior vice president and chief financial officer of Triad Guaranty Insurance Corp., a mortgage insurance provider based in Winston-Salem, N.C.Mr. Dana was most recently CFO with The Bankers Bank, Atlanta, and he was previously employed as chief operating officer and CFO by Lighthouse Financial Services, according to Triad. Triad Guaranty Insurance, a subsidiary of Triad Guaranty Inc., can be found on the Web at http://www.triadguaranty.com.

S.A. Ibrahim, a 27-year veteran of the banking and mortgage industries, has been named chief executive officer of Radian Group Inc., a Philadelphia-based mortgage insurer and provider of credit enhancement products and services.Mr. Ibrahim, 53, succeeds Frank Filipps, who is retiring from Radian. The appointment is effective May 5. Mr. Ibrahim was most recently president and chief executive officer of GreenPoint Mortgage, and he was previously GreenPoint's chief operating officer, leading the company through the acquisition of Headlands Mortgage, Radian said. Mr. Ibrahim was also employed by American Express and by the mortgage lending unit of Chemical Banking Corp., where he was CEO and COO.

Angelo Mozilo, chairman and chief executive officer of Countrywide Financial Corp., was the ninth-highest paid CEO among the 500 largest American public companies last year, according to a list compiled by Forbes.com.Forbes calculated Mr. Mozilo's 2004 compensation at $96.9 million and said he owned $40.5 million of company shares. Other mortgage-related CEOs among the top 100 in 2004 included Richard Kovacevich of Wells Fargo, who was 12th with $53.1 million in compensation; Robert Toll of Toll Brothers, 13th with $50.2 million; Jerry Grundhofer of US Bancorp, 21st at $38.6 million; William Foley of Fidelity National Financial, 32nd at $33.9 million; Edward Linde of Boston Properties, 48th at $24.2 million; Robert Wilmers of M&T Bank, 80th at $16.4 million; Kerry Killinger of Washington Mutual, 83rd at $15.7 million; and Ara Hovnanian of Hovnanian Enterprises, 99th at $13.4 million.