Chair role for ex-FSA chief
FORMER Financial Services Authority (FSA) chairman Sir Callum McCarthy has thrown his weight behind a new mortgage business.
Sir Callum is to become the chairman of Castle Trust, a new mortgage firm.
He will be joined on the board by a star-studded list of City names, including Lord Deben, the chairman of the Association of Independent Financial Advisers, and Dame Deirdre Hutton, a director of HM Treasury and former deputy chair of the FSA.
Castle Trust is being backed by JC Flowers, the US private equity house. Its European head Dr David Morgan, a well-known City name, will also be on seven-member-strong board of non-executive directors.
Patrick Gale, a non-executive director of pensions group Aegon, will also sit on the board, as will Richard Ramsay, a director at network services firm Redstone, and Timothy Hanford, a former director of Schroders.
The company, led by Sean Oldfield, claims it will offer mortgages that improve affordability and share the costs and risks of home ownership. It will also provide investment opportunities in the UK housing market to retail and institutional investors.
Oldfield has spent the past two years preparing for the launch of Castle Trust by working alongside JC Flowers to conduct market research.
Sir Callum stepped down as the chairman of the FSA in late 2008 at the height of the financial crisis.
He joined JC Flowers as its European chairman in 2009. He is also a director of HM Treasury.
He said: “The housing market is the largest asset class in the UK, worth in excess of £4,000bn, most of which has previously been unavailable to investors. Castle Trust has been designed to help customers with the two most important financial decisions in their lives – investing their savings and buying their home.”