Amigo Loans chief exec threatens to resign if former boss rejoins company
The chief executive of troubled subprime lender Amigo Loans has today threatened to resign from the company if its founder James Benamor rejoins in a management position.
Amigo told the stock market this morning that it had agreed that new chief executive Glen Crawford could resign if Benamor rejoins the business.
Benamor released a statement on Friday night arguing for his return to the company as group chief executive of the public limited company while retaining Crawford as chief executive of the Financial Conduct Authority (FCA)-regulated business.
He also called for the resignation of acting chair Roger Lovering and finance chief Nayan Kisnadwala.
Benamor threatened to call a shareholder’s vote this week to press his demands if the board did not agree to them.
Amigo’s board said: “Mr Crawford and the board are…equally aligned in their unanimous rejection of the views and proposals put forward by Mr Benamor on Friday evening.
“The board therefore urges Mr Benamor not to waste further time and expense for either Richmond Group or Amigo in seeking to bring his proposals to a shareholder vote.”
Crawford was chief executive of the business from 2016 until last year and rejoined the company this month pending FCA approval to take up his full duties as chief executive.
Guarantor lender Amigo has been swamped by thousands of complaints from customers who say they should never have been granted a loan.
Amigo reported a £37.9m loss for the year to the year ended 31 March, down from a profit of £111m the year before.
This was due to the cost of complaints jumping to £126.8m, compared to £100,000 in 2019.
Benamor is pushing for the company to take money out of its UK regulated lending business to avoid what he described as “fraud by consumers against lenders, and a campaign of looting led by claims management companies”.
Amigo Loans’ share price fell by a third to 11.8p today.