Five Questions With: Brian Schwinn

Brian Schwinn was appointed earlier this month as Boston-based Santander Bank’s head of asset-based lending and restructuring finance in Santander’s Commercial Banking division.

His basic focus is helping businesses with loans secured with their collateral and loans to help businesses restructure. He oversees that line of business on a nationwide basis for Santander Bank – the retail and commercial banking arm in the United States for Spain-based Banco Santander Group.

PBN: In your opinion, what sets Santander’s Commercial Banking division apart from its largest competitors?

SCHWINN: At Santander, we’re focused on creating long-term value for our clients and we offer unique characteristics that set us apart from our commercial banking peers.

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The biggest [is] our international footprint. We have the global resources to work with our colleagues in a variety of geographies in Latin and South America, Asia and Europe, which we call the “global advantage.” This means not only providing capital, but local knowledge and expertise in respect to a variety of challenges that companies face in the international arena, such as regulation, business development and product representation.

And Santander approaches clients and prospects with the intent of being a life cycle financial partner. That is, we have industry knowledge and execution platforms to help our clients as their needs evolve, so if a client wants to make an acquisition, we can meet their needs or, conversely, we have platforms and resources to help make clients leverage their assets when cash flows are less certain.

Other advantages that set us apart from our peers are our rates and foreign exchange capabilities, which are very strong and provide our customers with protection against volatility in both markets.

PBN: Which government actions and marketplace factors do you currently see as having the greatest impact on Santander’s ability to grow its asset-based lending and restructuring finance business?

SCHWINN: While the regulatory environment continues to shift for the banking industry, from the asset-based perspective we are focused on the challenges to our customers and how we can help to solve them. The impact of tariffs is certainly first and foremost in a number of our customers’ minds and we spend time in almost every meeting discussing these factors and impacts.

Driver shortages in the trucking industry are a marketplace factor that most of our customers are dealing with either directly or indirectly. We are also watching the continued increase in interest rates and have developed programs for a number of clients to address that risk.

PBN: How can asset-based lending and/or restructuring finance be tailored to meet the needs of a particular region, such as the Boston-Providence area?

SCHWINN: Both asset-based lending and restructuring finance are tools to help companies grow or navigate uncertain financial times when “traditional” financing may not be available or comes at too high a cost.

Asset-based lending allows our customers to tap into their assets to enhance liquidity when cash flow is limited or specific needs arise. Restructuring finance is to some extent a bridge for companies where Santander is a life cycle financing partner, enabling our customers to move from a turnaround or other event-driven challenge to the next phase of their business model with the ultimate objective of returning to the traditional banking market.

PBN: Which industries do you think offer Santander the greatest opportunities to expand its commercial banking footprint?

SCHWINN: We are generally industry agnostic and look at each company’s strengths in determining the optimal solution. We have expertise in a variety of industries that we feel are good opportunities for Santander.

PBN: If you had to choose one deal you sealed in your banking career that you’re most proud of, what would that be?

SCHWINN: I have had the opportunity to work with a variety of excellent teams across various financing products and jurisdictions. In each role, I could name more than one deal about which I am very proud, but they all share one characteristic, which is innovative solutions for our customers. I look forward to those challenges and using creativity to distinguish ourselves from our peers.

Scott Blake is a PBN staff writer. Email him at Blake@pbn.com.