Credit Strategy Senior Associate

Overview

About Allica Bank

Allica is the UK’s fastest growing company - and the fastest-growing financial technology (Fintech) firm ever. Our purpose is to help established SMEs, one of the last major underserved opportunities in Fintech.

Established SMEs are the backbone of local communities - representing over a third of our economy - yet have been largely neglected both by traditional high street banks and modern fintech providers.

Department Description

The Credit Strategy Team sits at the heart of Allica’s lending proposition, responsible for managing credit risk, defining lending participation choices and driving forward growth through credit strategies that optimise the balance of risk and reward in our portfolio. To do so the team balances excellence in problem-solving and analytical thinking, with robust technical and data knowledge.

Role Description

As a Senior Associate you will play a key role in defining and shaping our lending proposition, making strategic decisions to drive growth and manage the risk in a loan portfolio of £3bn+ and growing, and playing a pivotal role in driving Allica’s growing competitive advantage and success in the market.

You will utilise your thorough expertise on data analytics, as well as your knowledge of credit products, and SME financing to drive Allica’s journey in disrupting the SME lending industry, fuelling market-leading growth.

This fast-paced role provides a great opportunity for exposure to senior stakeholders and to make a meaningful impact shaping the way in which data is used and portfolio decisions are made at Allica.

Principal Accountabilities

• Lead our credit strategy
• Design frameworks and credit strategies that guide Allica’s lending participation choices and balance risk and reward in the portfolio in line with Allica’s broader strategy and risk appetite.
• Conduct deep-dives into emerging areas of potential risk and opportunity, separating the signal from the noise, sharing the key insights with the Lending Leadership team.
• Drive in-market actions, channelling Allica’s lending appetite, product development and growth to the areas with the optimal balance between risk and reward.
• Regularly assess and evaluate the effectiveness of the credit strategies to ensure continued alignment with risk appetite and sustained success, staying abreast of evolving regulatory requirements and industry best practices.
• Contribute to the optimisation of pricing strategies to enhance overall performance and profitability.
• Collaborate with cross-functional teams, including data scientists, data analytics, data engineering, marketing, underwriting, and product teams to design and implement credit strategy changes.
• Drive our credit risk monitoring
• Improve the mechanisms for tracking and reporting lending performance, identifying and monitoring emerging risks, and integrating insights into credit strategies.
• Identify key risks, opportunities and trends in a structured way, and assessing their evolution over time.
• Develop insightful reporting for the core decision-making committees in the bank, including dashboards and presentations to provide insights into the performance of the credit portfolio.
• Identify and work with internal and third-party data sources, and implement innovative solutions that create value and drive competitive differentiation across the lending journey.
• Support credit risk forecasting and analysis
• Contribute to the Bank’s forecasting of credit risk to include impairments under IFRS9, Probability of Default, Loss Given Default, Exposure at Default and Expected Loss.
• Assist with the annual review and challenge of the IFRS9 model methodology and assumptions to ensure ECL calculations are in line with IFRS9 standards.

Personal Attributes & Experience

Credit Knowledge:

• At least 3 years of experience working in a data-driven and credit risk / lending strategy role in a bank or alternative fintech lender.
• Experience in Commercial Lending, Mortgages, Asset Finance, and Working Capital facilities is strongly desirable.
• Understanding of how test & learn methods should work; able to smell test strategies (i.e. going beyond just the data) based on experience of credit…