Encina Lender Finance Hires Structured Credit Industry Veteran Geoff Beard as Co-CEO to Lead Consumer/SMB Vertical

Atlanta, GA – June 25, 2024 – Encina Lender Finance, LLC (“ELF”) announced today that it has hired structured credit industry veteran Geoff Beard as Co-CEO to lead the firm’s Consumer/SMB Vertical.  Mr. Beard will work in partnership with Co-CEO Edward Chang, who will lead ELF’s Commercial Vertical, and will be opening a new office in San Francisco that will provide the firm with a presence on both coasts.

Mr. Beard has spent the past 25+ years working at the intersection of specialty finance and fintech, both as a principal investor and investment banker.  His principal investment experience spans asset-backed credit facilities, forward flow asset purchase programs and preferred equity / convertible debt across the consumer credit, small business credit, secured real estate credit, point-of-sale finance, and student lending sectors both in the U.S. and numerous foreign jurisdictions.  Mr. Beard has a demonstrated track record of building and leading cross-functional teams of investment and credit risk professionals to originate and execute creative portfolio financing solutions while driving attractive income-oriented returns with a strong emphasis on capital preservation. 

About Encina Lender Finance

Operating from both coasts, ELF offers revolving lines of credit, delayed draw term loans, and forward flow purchase programs ranging in size from $50 - $150 million to emerging and established specialty finance companies with strong junior capital sponsorship across a wide range of short-to-intermediate duration asset classes in the consumer and commercial finance sectors.  Targeted consumer asset classes include unsecured installment and revolving loans (direct-to-consumer and point-of-sale), secured vehicle finance, home improvement, and student lending (in-school vocational, refi).  Targeted commercial asset classes include asset-based lending, factoring, equipment finance, floorplan finance, CRE bridge lending, enterprise value lending, and small balance SMB lending (both direct-to-business and embedded point-of-sale).  In addition, ELF provides streamlined “first-out” financing to other like-minded private credit investors in the specialty finance sector.  ELF utilizes a combination of cutting-edge technologies and rigorous collateral-level analysis to generate differentiated investment insights and to formulate creative solutions to its counterparties’ portfolio and enterprise financing needs.  For additional information, please visit ELF’s website at: https://lenderfinance.encinacapital.com.