Jeff Longhurst, former ABFA CEO, joins Finativ to expand sector expertise
With more commercial finance organisations seeking to grow outside their traditional product boundaries, specialist consulting and corporate finance firm Finativ have expanded their “finance native” expertise with the appointment of Jeff Longhurst as consulting director.
Longhurst offers true subject matter expertise allowing Finativ to help clients expand from asset to invoice finance, or vice versa, guide new entrants to the receivables and ABL financing markets and provide vital insights to existing and emerging players. He is immediately playing a key role within Finativ, assisting a major asset finance provider to build a low cost, greenfield factoring operation.
Longhurst has over 40 years’ experience in invoice finance – over 20 years as CEO/managing director – in large banks, foreign bank subsidiaries, specialist lenders and independents. He was VC backed to set up and then sold his own invoice finance business and has advised a range of invoice finance and fintech businesses.
Jeff has very strong market connections, having been chairman and CEO of the Asset Based Finance Association and managing director, Commercial and Asset Based Finance at UK Finance, the consolidated financial services trade association.
The Finativ view is that demand for invoice finance will grow over the short to medium term.
The firm’s CEO, Christian Roelofs, commented, “In economic downturns, asset finance volumes may shrink but short-term invoice finance lending grows and margins are attractive, as long as systems and operations are robust. Invoice and asset finance are natural hedges, while the insights gained from invoice financing operations result in better understanding of market risk and better collections management. Jeff is a recognised market expert who is able to help clients grow while navigating the tricky economic conditions we envisage”.
More appointments are anticipated in the near future, in line with the ambitious growth plans of Finativ.