Guidance Financial Group
Nick MinardiSenior Vice President and COO, Guidance Residential
Mr Minardi is the Chief Operating Officer of Guidance Residential LLC. He has over 35 years of experience in the banking and mortgage lending Industry. His experience includes 20 Years as SVP and Chief Lending officer for a regional bank where he was responsible for the development of new products, retail and wholesale lending platforms and servicing. He also helped to start up and was a senior executive in two national mortgage lending platforms which grew to over 2,000 employees and originated over $5 Billion in annual originations. For both of these institutions he was the Chief Credit Officer and Director of Risk Management. His responsibilities included setting credit standards and policies and procedures, establishing and overseeing risk management activities, internal audit, servicing and investor relations. He has extensive knowledge in the financial planning, operations, secondary marketing activity and servicing related to lending platforms.read lessread full biographySaleem BelbisiCEO, GuidanceATEL Equipment Company
Mr Belbisi, based in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia, is CEO of GuidanceATEL Equipment Support Company where he has overall responsibility for the management and performance of the company, a joint venture between Guidance Investments and ATEL Capital Group. Mr Belbisi is a leading Saudi Arabian Corporate Banking and asset financing executive with broad national experience in managing portfolios, underwriting, risk management and business development. Mr Belbisi was previously Assistant General Manager for SAMBA Financial Group managing a sizable portfolio of SAR 12 billion. Prior to moving to the Kingdom, Mr Belbisi spent 8 years with Arab Bank Jordan Ltd. where he held numerous management positions culminating in corporate banking Unit Head and Credit Risk Manager. Mr Belbisi has an MA in Finance from Edinburgh Business School, higher diploma in Financial Analysis from Institution of Banking Studies — Jordan and BA in Finance from University of Jordan.read lessread full biographyTom GainorSenior Vice President and General Counsel, Guidance Residential
Mr Gainor, based in Reston, Virginia, is a Senior Vice President with Guidance Residential where he is responsible for product development, Shariah structuring and compliance as well as all regulatory oversight and licensing. He has over 20 years of diversified professional experience as a lawyer, accountant and financial product engineer. Prior to joining Guidance, Mr Gainor served as Managing Partner in the London office of The International Investor ("TII"), a prominent Islamic investment bank. Prior to London, he spent four years in TII's Kuwait based corporate headquarters where he chaired its product development committee and had primary responsibility for its wholesale distribution strategy. Mr Gainor is a licensed attorney, a Certified Public Accountant and a Certified Management Accountant. He earned his BA in Accounting from the University of Rhode Island and both his JD and LLM in Taxation from The University of Miami School of Law.read lessread full biographyKal ElsayedCEO, Guidance Residential
Mr Elsayed, based in Reston, Virginia, is President and CEO of Guidance Residential where he has overall responsibility of the management and performance of the company. He is a leading US mortgage industry executive with broad national experience in all aspects of the business, including sales and operations. He is an accomplished leader in start-up and high-growth business environments and has extensive experience in building motivated teams to achieve and exceed target objectives. Mr Elsayed was previously President and CEO of HomeView Lending, where he helped start the company and build its sales and operating structure. Prior to HomeView, he held various executive positions with New Century Mortgage Corp, culminating in the position of President of the Wholesale Division, where he assumed full P&L responsibility and grew annual production from US$4 billion to US$46 billion over a three-year period.read lessread full biographyGeorge AndersonSenior Advisor
Mr Anderson is Head of Structured Finance, Guidance Financial Group, and has over 30 years of professional experience in the mortgage finance sector. Mr Anderson served as the Executive Vice President, Chief Operating Officer of Ginnie Mae, a wholly owned US government corporation, from July 1996 to October 2004. In recent years, Mr Anderson has been called upon to advise numerous foreign governments in Africa, Asia, Central and South America, seeking to develop their primary and secondary mortgage markets. From 1971 to 1979, Mr Anderson was a Financial Analyst for the New Communities Administration in the US Department of Housing and Urban Development, responsible for underwriting applications for loan guaranties up to US$50 million for large-scale, mixed-use land development projects. Mr Anderson is a Year 2000 recipient of the Presidential Distinguished Rank Award, the highest award given to members of the Senior Executive Service. He holds a BA in business from Loyola University of Chicago, an MBA in Finance from the University of Chicago; and was a PhD candidate in Management Science (economics & finance) at the University of California, Los Angeles.read lessread full biographyHaresham BaharumAssociate Director, Institutional and Product Development, Guidance Investments
Mr Baharum, based in Kuala Lumpur, is Associate Director, Institutional Business and Product Development at Guidance Investments and has been involved in the development and structuring of Shariah-compliant financing products and investment funds. This included the structuring of a Shariah compliant home financing product in the US, the development of the first Shariah-compliant mortgage backed securities fund and a US multifamily residential ijarah lease finance program, as well as a China residential property development fund. Prior to this, he was with Islamic Capital Technology, an Islamic finance advisory firm. With more than 14 years experience in the financial services industry, Mr Baharum initially trained as an equity investment analyst at Prudential Portfolio Managers in London, before later moving into fund management with Prudential in Kuala Lumpur. In 1997, he joined the equity research team of a securities firm and specialized in the telecommunications, media and transportation sectors. In 1999, Mr Baharum joined a boutique financial advisory firm, Libra Capital Partners, where he was involved in several corporate finance and restructuring exercises of private and multinational companies. Mr Baharum holds a BA in Accounting & Finance from Lancaster University, UK.read lessread full biographyPatrick van SurellDirector, Institutional Business and Product Development, Guidance Investments
Mr Van Surell, based in Kuala Lumpur, is Director, Institutional Business and Product Development at Guidance Investments with over 20 years’ experience. Most recently, he was Head of Corporate Finance with Shariah-compliant Unicorn Investment Bank (UIB), where he worked for six years on a wide range of investment and corporate finance assignments. During 2010-2011, he was seconded to Riyadh, Saudi Arabia as Chief Executive Officer of Unicorn Capital Saudi Arabia, the investment banking subsidiary of UIB. Prior to 2005, Mr Van Surell was Vice President with Swicorp in Jeddah, where he advised GCC and European investors on mergers & acquisitions, joint-ventures, equity and debt raising, restructuring and private equity investments. Before moving to the Gulf, he was Vice President Mergers & Acquisition at JP Morgan in London, UK, where he initiated and closed numerous M&A and equity transactions. Prior to this he worked as a corporate finance professional at Credit Agricole Indosuez, Credit Suisse First Boston and Barclays de Zoete Wedd. Mr Van Surell started his career as a corporate lawyer with Berlioz & Co in 1991, first in Paris, France then in London, UK. He has a MA in Corporate & Tax Law and a BA in Corporate Law both from University Pantheon Sorbonne, Paris, France.read lessread full biographyJames DodwellSenior Vice President, Capital Guidance
Mr Dodwell, based in Washington, DC, is a Senior Vice President at Capital Guidance with 23 years of experience. His responsibilities cover two main areas: corporate/business development in the company’s wholly-owned operating businesses and overall management of a portfolio of liquid and alternative financial investments. Instrumental in the founding and expansion of Guidance Investments, where he serves as COO, Mr Dodwell has been involved in all aspects of the group’s Shariah-compliant investments and operations in the financial services, housing finance, real estate, leasing, and private equity investment sectors. In addition, he manages the group’s portfolio of over 50 funds in the equity, fixed income, credit and private equity markets throughout the US, Europe and Asia. He also oversees all back office functions including risk monitoring, currency hedging, portfolio rebalancing, cash flow budgeting and reporting. In 1996, he was a founding member and Managing Director at Marconi Pacific, a strategy and venture consulting firm, and prior to that, he was a senior manager at GapGemini. Mr Dodwell holds a BA and MA from Cambridge University and an MBA from the Stanford University Graduate School of Business.read lessread full biographyDr Hasnita HashimSenior Advisor and member of the Board, Guidance Investments
Dr Hashim, based in Kuala Lumpur, is a Senior Advisor and Member of the Board of Directors of Guidance Investments having previously served as the Head of Product Development and Institutional Business with Guidance Financial Group and CEO of Guidance Investments. She has 24 years of financial management experience in the field of asset management, structured finance and asset securitization and is one of the pioneers in Islamic investment banking. In 1998, she founded IslamiQ, the world’s first online Islamic finance portal. From 1994 to 1998, she was the Chief Executive Officer of Commerce MGI Sdn Bhd (CMGI), Malaysia, which successfully closed mandates of US$1 billion in Islamic financing under her leadership, and a member of the Management Committee and Relationship Director of First Islamic Investment Bank, Bahrain. From 1992 to 1994, Dr Hashim was a senior portfolio manager with Rashid Hussain Asset Management, a premier asset management company in Malaysia, where she had funds under management of US$200 million and where she was also actively involved in product development, including Islamic equity products. Dr Hashim holds a BS in Physics from Surrey University and a PhD in Nuclear Physics from Oxford University. She is also an associate of the Institute of Actuaries, Staple Inn, London.read lessread full biographyDr Mohamad HammourChairman, Guidance Financial Group
Dr Hammour is Chairman of Guidance Financial Group and a Managing Director of Capital Guidance where he has been an executive over the past 22 years. Since founding Guidance Financial Group in the year 2000, Dr Hammour has led the development and execution of the company’s strategy, has overseen the growth of its organization and international expansion, and has established key strategic partnerships that form the foundation of some of the company’s main business lines. Dr Hammour is an accomplished economist, having served as: a member of the economics faculty at Columbia University and of the visiting faculty at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology; a Director of Research at the Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique in France; a Research Fellow at the Centre for Economic Policy Research in the United Kingdom; and a consultant to the World Bank. His research has been published in leading scholarly journals of economics. Dr Hammour holds a BA in Philosophy and an MS in Industrial Engineering from Stanford University and a PhD in Economics from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology.read lessread full biography
The following executives of Guidance Financial Group’s parent company, Capital Guidance, work closely with the management listed above.
Amer Hammour
Managing Director, Washington DC
Hazem Farra
Managing Director, Beirut
Martin Bury
Senior Vice President, Geneva
Rémy Fremaux
Chief Financial Officer, Geneva