RateSetter hires ING veteran as Australian director
RATESETTER has hired former ING Direct Australia chief Vaughn Richtor to help the firm grow its business in the region.
Richtor has joined the peer-to-peer lender’s Australian subsidiary as non-executive director, expanding RateSetter Australia’s board to five directors. The other board members comprise co-founder Peter Behrens, the boss of the Australian arm Daniel Foggo, Stratton Finance head Rob Chaloner and experienced technology investor Martin Dalgleish.
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Richtor brings many years of expertise in challenger-lender strategy as he served as challenger and growth countries chief executive for ING Asia.
During his 24-year career at the Dutch bank he helped found ING’s Australian arm in the 1990s, which went on to become a key challenger to the country’s four major banks.
Richtor said ING’s Australian success story stemmed from the belief “there has to be a better way of delivering financial services” for customers, according to The Australian, which first reported the new appointment.
“I got quite excited when talking to Daniel — who has done a good job in getting it going — but to make a difference it has really got to get to scale and hopefully I can add some value in doing that,” he said.
“It has shown there is appeal both on the investor and borrower side, now the challenge is to get it to scale to make a real difference and become structurally relevant in the market.”
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Foggo said RateSetter would draw on Richtor’s expertise to deepen its penetration in the loan broker market.
“Vaughn has obviously been running one of the largest banks in Australia and has [shown] how you take market share from large incumbents,” he reportedly said.
UK-headquartered Ratesetter launched its Australian business in 2014 and hit a milestone of 5,000 investors last December. It said it expected to double this figure over the following six months, as consumers eschew banks for alternative finance options.
The platform was then funding around AUS$2m in loans per week and its loan book has grown by approximately 200 per cent over the past year.
