White Oak Commercial Finance (“WOCF”), an affiliate of San Francisco-based alternative investment manager White Oak Global Advisors, LLC (“White Oak”), today announced Andy McGhee, Susan Hall and Neal Mulford have joined the firm to further expand its asset-based lending (ABL) and lender finance capabilities. Andy, Susan and Neal together bring over 100 years of combined experience to WOCF, after most recently originating, deploying and managing a multi-billion dollar ABL portfolio at AloStar Capital Finance. All three are based in Atlanta, GA and will report to the WOCF Board.
Andy McGhee joins WOCF as Vice Chairman and will lead its Lender Finance division while assisting with the growth of the broader ABL initiatives for WOCF. Andy previously served as Founder, President and CEO of AloStar Capital Finance. He has over 30 years of commercial banking and asset-based financing experience, having held senior leadership roles at SunTrust Bank, Bank of America and Citicorp prior to joining AloStar.
Susan Hall joins as Chief Portfolio Officer and will lead the integration of portfolio reporting across all White Oak ABL platforms. Susan previously served in senior leadership roles at AloStar Capital Finance, SunTrust Bank, GE Capital, Citicorp and Transamerica.
Neal Mulford joins as Head of Underwriting and Portfolio Management for WOCF’s Lender Finance business. Neal previously held senior underwriting and portfolio management leadership roles at AloStar Capital Finance, CIT Bank, Regions Bank and Heller Financial.
Andre Hakkak, CEO of White Oak, comments: "We are excited to have this first class team join our growing ambitions to build a scalable ABL platform for the benefit of institutional investors worldwide. Unlike a bank that finances ABL with mostly a liability-driven balance sheet, White Oak finances ABL loans with investor capital. In a low interest rate environment, asset-based loans provide compelling risk-adjusted yields with investment grade or near-investment grade risk profiles.”
“I am excited to be part of a spectacular team that has built a strong track record in the ABL space, backed by robust infrastructure and technology systems to process all types of ABL products,” says Andy McGhee.
“Andy and his team developed a great business at AloStar Capital Finance, and we look forward to enhancing White Oak’s capabilities with their leadership here,” states Tom Otte, Chairman of WOCF.
Today, WOCF employs over 100 professionals focused on invoice discounting, factoring, supply chain finance and other ABL products serving borrowers in the U.S. and internationally. In 2019, WOCF deployed over $300 million of capital across its various product offerings. It expects to deploy over $500 million of capital in 2020 as the COVID-19 pandemic creates demand for working capital across various industries.