Leasing News - information, news, education and entertainment for the commercial bank, finance and leasing industry

######## surrounding the article denotes it is a press release, it was not written by Leasing News nor has the information been verified, but from the source noted. When an article is signed by the writer, it is considered a byline. It reflects the opinion and research of the writer.

New Hires/Promotions in the Leasing Business
and Related Industries

Christopher Gittens was promoted to EVP Leasing, Element Fleet Management, Dublin City, County Dublin, Ireland. He is located in Mississauga, Ontario, Canada. He joined Element Fleet as Chief
Commercial Officer, July, 2013, promoted President, Missisauga Ontario, Canada, October, 2017, promoted Equipment Vice President, Sales, Toronto, promoted EVP Strategic Relationships, Toronto, Ontario ,October 2019, promoted EVP Strategic Relationships, March, 2019 Toronto, Ontario, promoted Chief Information Officer, February, 2022. He was at GE Capital Solutions, starting May, 2004, Structuring Manager, promoted 2006, Senior Manager, promoted October, 2005, Vice President, National Accounts, Fleet Services. He began his career at TD Commercial Banking, starting May 1998, Financial Analyst, promoted Relationship Manager (2000 - 2004).
https://www.linkedin.com/in/christophergittens/

Jenni Greiner was hired as Senior Credit Analyst, Balboa Capital, Costa Mesa, California. She is located in the Denver Metropolitan Area. Previously, she was at Key Equipment Finance, starting August, 2011, Credit Analyst, promoted to Senior Credit Analyst (March, 2018 - June, 2023).
https://www.linkedin.com/in/jenni-greiner/

Amy M. Gross was hired as Senior Vice President, head of Equipment Finance, Falcon National Bank, Saint Cloud, Minnesota. She is located in the Denver Metropolitan Area. Previously, she was at Key Equipment Finance, starting May, 2009, Senior Vice President, Municipal and Specialty Vehicles, promoted April 2016, Senior Vice President, Key Government Finance, Municipal and Federal, promoted April, 2019, Executive Vice President, Commercial Vendor and Government Finance until June, 2023. Prior, she was at GE Capital for 17 years 5 months, starting August, 1991, Senior Financial Analyst, promoted January, 1996, Sales Representative, promoted March, 2000, National Sales Manager, promoted January, 2004, Relationship Manager, promoted Vice President, Inside Sales and Operations, March 2006.
Full Bio:
https://www.linkedin.com/in/amymgross/details/experience
https://www.linkedin.com/in/amymgross

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November Downturn for Commercial Finance
ELFA Reports Volume Down 19 Percent

(Leasing News Chart)

The Equipment Leasing and Finance Association’s (ELFA) Monthly Leasing and Finance Index overall new business volume for November was $8.3 billion, unchanged from new business volume in November 2022. Volume was down 19 percent from $10.4 billion in October. Year-to-date, cumulative new business volume was up 4.1 percent compared to 2022.

(ELFA Chart - click image to view larger)

Leigh Lytle, appointed new ELFA President in October, on duty Since December 4, stated in the ELFA Press Release, “Moving into the final month of the year, MLFI participants report mixed performance. Year-to-date originations are healthy despite some softness in year-over-year and month-to-month November data. Both losses and delinquencies show more acceptable levels, and no further rate increases by the Fed for the foreseeable future is more good news. With the increasing likelihood of a ‘soft landing’ the equipment finance industry should have a positive year-end.”

Her background is excellent for her new position at ELFA. According to her LinkedIn bio: she was Head of North American Policy, Plaid, San Francisco, California. She joined the Federal Reserve Bank of San Francisco, December, 2011, Director, Statistics, promoted Vice President, January, 2018, promoted Group Vice President, April, 2019; Founder, Director, Persistent Ventures (August, 2017 - January, 2022).
https://www.linkedin.com/in/leighlytle/details/experience/

Full ELFA November Business Press Release:
https://www.elfaonline.org/knowledge-hub/monthly-leasing-and-finance-index/view-mlfi/monthly-leasing-and-finance-index-november-2023

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Leasing and Finance Industry Help Wanted

The Two Reasons You Get Hired
by Ken Lubin, ZRG Partners, Managing Director

We live in a world that is focused on results. No matter what you do or where your go, your results dictate whether or not you get hired or fired, make the team or not, or separate yourself from the crowd. Your results follow you everywhere and are what we are gauged on (grades, sales numbers, cost savings, etc. We can be the best, nicest, and hardest working person in the world but if your results don’t show progress or growth, you will not be hired or you will be the first to be fired.

The truth about getting hired in today’s world comes down to two things: Are you making the company money or are you saving the company money? If you are not doing either of these things, you are expendable. You will be the first to let go at a downturn and will be the last to get hired. Make sure you have quantifiable results that show that you excel in your profession, because this is the only true way to job security.

Ken Lubin, Managing Director
ZRG Partners, LLC
Americas I EMEA I Asia Pacific
C: 508-733-4789
https://www.linkedin.com/in/klubin

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Top Ten Leasing News Read by Readers
December 18 - December 21

(1) New Hires/Promotions in the Leasing Business
and Related Industries
https://leasingnews.org/archives/Dec2023/12_21.htm#hires

(2) Correction
Jim Merrilees, CLFP, is Not Retired
https://leasingnews.org/archives/Dec2023/12_18.htm#correction

(3) Penalties for Failure to Comply
With State Disclosure Laws
By Kenneth C. Greene, Leasing News Emeritus
https://leasingnews.org/archives/Dec2023/12_18.htm#penalties

(4) New Hires/Promotions in the Leasing Business
and Related Industries
https://leasingnews.org/archives/Dec2023/12_18.htm#hires

(5) Alternative Lenders Are Number One Source
of Small Credit Sources - Coleman Reports
https://leasingnews.org/archives/Dec2023/12_21.htm#alt

(6) Commercial Finance Disclosure;
The Small Business Data Collection Rule; and
The Corporate Transparency Act
By Sloan Schickler, Esq.
https://leasingnews.org/archives/Dec2023/12_21.htm#comm

(7) Why I Became a CLP (1996)
Theresa Kabot, CLP, BPB
https://leasingnews.org/archives/Dec2023/12_21.htm#why

(8) CLFP Growth by Company End of Year 2023
Added 247 Members for Total of 1,466 CLFP's
https://leasingnews.org/archives/Dec2023/12_21.htm#clfp

(9) CLFP Foundation Adds 10 New CLFPs
Bringing the Total for the Year 1,466
https://leasingnews.org/archives/Dec2023/12_18.htm#clf

(10) Balancing Experience and Innovation in Hiring
By Ken Lubin, ZFG Partners, Managing Director
https://leasingnews.org/archives/Dec2023/12_18.htm#balancing

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The Apple Watch's Popularity
is Unmatched in the U.S.

Apple will be able to sell the latest Apple Watches after an import ban was temporarily paused by an appeals court on Wednesday, in a major victory for the iPhone maker.

The Statista Consumer Insights shows the Apple Watch is by far the most popular smartwatch/fitness tracker in the United States. 59 percent of more than 3,000 smartwatch/fitness tracker users surveyed between October 2022 and September 2023 claim to use an Apple Watch, miles ahead of Fitbit, which 27 percent of respondents claimed to be using. Other popular brands such as Samsung, Google and Garmin are even further behind, illustrating how unmatched the Apple Watch is in terms of popularity.

www.statista.com

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Which City Has the Most Millionaires?
Let's Start with the Top 30

(c;ick image to view larger)

Heading the list, New York City boasts of an astonishing 340,000 millionaire residents, accounting for approximately 4% of the city’s total population. New York’s status as a global financial hub attracts millions seeking high-paying jobs, while those with lucrative careers are naturally drawn to the city.

Note: the population of 290,000, was closely followed by the Bay Area—San Francisco and Silicon Valley—with 285,000 high net worth individuals (HNWIs) possessing an investable wealth of $1 million or more.

Other major financial centers—London (4th), Singapore (5th), Hong Kong (7th)—take up the middle spots in the top 10, joined by China’s commerce juggernauts, Beijing (8th) and Shanghai (9th).

One notable entry to the list is Sydney, which surprisingly holds the 10th position, with more than 100,000 millionaires.

Here is the full Visualcapitals Cities with the Most Millionaires in the World:
https://www.visualcapitalist.com/cities-most-millionaires

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Commercial Finance/Leasing Finance Conferences
2024

January 5: de Banked Broker Battle, Miami, Florida
https://leasingnews.org/archives/Nov2023/11_15.htm#battle

March 5-7: Funder's Forum, Miami, Florida
https://leasingnews.org/Ads/Completed/brokers_expo112023.html

March 25–28: NEFA Finance Summit, Huntington Beach, CA

April 16–18: AACFB Conference, Glendale, Arizona
https://annualconference.aacfb.org/home

April 16-18: ELFA National Funding Conference, Chicago, IL

April 30-May 1: AGLF Conference, Austin, Texas

May 5–7: Equipment Finance Connect, Nashville, Tenn.
https://equipmentfinanceconnect.com

Sept. 4-5: AACFB Commercial Financing Expo New Orleans, LA

Sept. 10-12: Auto Finance CEOs, San Antonio, Texas

Sept. 10-12, CFLA Conference, St. John's, NL, Canada

Oct. 16-18: NVLA Conference, Clearwater Beach, Florida

Oct. 27-29: 63rd ELFA Annual Convention, Austin, TX

Nov. 3- Nov. 5: NACLB Conference, Las Vegas, NV

Nov. 11-14: NEFA Funding Symposium, Indianapolis, Indiana

To be listed, email: kitmenkin@leasingnews.org

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The Best of 2023 in Film
by Fernando Croce, Leasing News Movie Reviewer

As the year winds down and we look forward to 2024, it’s time to take stock of its most indelible cinematic achievements. So we offer a list, in alphabetical order, to help viewers catch up with the gems they may have missed and the discoveries that do the medium justice. Check out later issues for fuller coverage as titles become available for streaming.

Are You There God? It's Me, Margaret: Judy Blume’s beloved novel gets an irresistible screen treatment in this heartfelt adaptation. Abby Rider Fortson delights as the awkward teen heroine who establishes a private communication with the Almighty while trying to make sense of life during puberty. Treating the protagonist’s mix of spiritual awareness and sexual inquisitiveness with empathy and humor, director Kelly Fremon Craig’s crowd-pleasing comedy is at once specific and universal.

The Boy and the Heron: Thankfully not following up on his retirement plans, Japanese animation master Hayao Miyazaki returns with a deeply felt fantasy that ravishingly mixes youthful curiosity with twilight serenity. Detailing the fantastic journey a boy embarks on in search of his mother, Miyazaki serves up layers upon layers of dream worlds anchored by gorgeously imaginative style and a profound sense of wonder, loss, and perseverance.

Fallen Leaves: A bare-bones romantic poem from Finnish director Aki Kaurismaki, this is a burst of humanistic warmth that can break hearts without raising its voice. As it observes the tentative romance that blooms between a couple of lonely, middle-aged workers in Helsinki, countless small but piercing details emerge and coalesce into a rich tragicomic mosaic. As always with Kaurismaki, it’s about the deep reserves of passion behind the frigid deadpan.

Ferrari: For big commercial ventures that double as obsessively personal projects, there’s no beating this ripping drama from action master Michael Mann. Charting three turbulent months in the life of Italian racer and businessman Enzo Ferrari (Adam Driver) in the 1950s, this is opulent, tingling cinema that uses the standard biopic format for a trenchant study in capitalism, the thin line between thrills and dangers, and the sheer pleasure of the camera’s style.

Killers of the Flower Moon: The great Martin Scorsese delves into one of American history’s darkest chapters with this extraordinary epic, which uses a fact-based crime to analyze how a nation can be built on unspeakable tragedy. Set in Oklahoma during the 1920s, the movie locates societal rot in wide open plains as the rise of capitalism connects to the oppression and genocide of indigenous peoples. Leonardo DiCaprio, Robert De Niro and Lily Gladstone lead a sprawling cast.

The Master Gardener: Completing a loose trilogy that includes “First Reformed” and “The Card Counter,” Paul Schrader serves up a compelling and elegant mood piece that powerfully articulates the filmmaker’s obsessive themes. Following characters suspended between the meticulous control of their exteriors and the messiness of their inner emotions, the film maintains a placidly meditative surface only to shatter it with coiled feeling in the best Schrader tradition.

May December: A master of layered, provocative melodrama, director Todd Haynes is in top form in this complex examination of performance, camp, reality, and cinema itself. The plot follows the making of a film based on a scandalous story, but that’s mainly a jumping-off point for analyzing the curious relationships between the characters, and allowing sterling turns by Julianne Moore, Natalie Portman and Charles Melton. Assured, unsettling, and darkly funny.

Menus-Plaisirs–Les Troisgros: Veteran master documentarian Frederick Wiseman takes a culinary spin to his patented institutional studies, and in the process offers one of his most purely pleasurable works. A meticulous look at the generation-spanning restaurant run by the French Toisgros family, the picture is an ultimately rapturous look at the bustling quotidian rituals—as well as the miniature artistry and harmony—of the place and its people.

Showing Up: Known for her spare and glum character studies, director Kelly Reichardt lightens up in this deft comedy-drama. Michelle Williams is terrific as a frazzled Oregon sculptor who specializes in minimalistic portraits, a clear stand-in for the filmmaker herself. Plot remains less important than mood and observation, as Reichardt burrows gently but deeply into her prickly heroine’s psyche for a snapshot of the struggle between art and life where silences speak volumes.

Tori and Lokita: Jean-Pierre and Luc Dardenne paint a heartbreaking portrait of solidarity in a harsh world with this drama, which characteristically fuses the gritty and the poetic. Chronicling the often-perilous struggles of young African immigrants in the margins of suburban Belgium, the acclaimed directors use intimate, dynamic camerawork to fashion a suspenseful, passionately humanistic document that tempers the bleakness of the characters’ lives with moments of hard-won poignancy.

News Briefs---

Slow Rollout of National Charging System
Could Hinder E.V. Adoption
https://www.nytimes.com/2023/12/23/us/politics/electric-vehicle-chargers-network.html

From boardrooms to bedrooms: These eight downtown
Boston office buildings could soon become apartments
https://www.bostonglobe.com/2023/12/28/business/office-conversions-housing-crisis-downtown-boston/

How China’s Property Crisis Blew Up
Bets That Couldn’t Lose
https://www.nytimes.com/2023/12/28/business/citic-trust-china-property.html

In reversal, U.S. to heighten efforts to collect
billions in unpaid Covid loans
https://www.washingtonpost.com/business/2023/12/28/sba-eidl-loans-debts/

The Times Sues OpenAI and Microsoft Over
A.I. Use of Copyrighted Work
https://www.nytimes.com/2023/12/27/business/media-york-times-open-ai-microsoft-lawsuit.html

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California Pushes Electric Trucks
as the Future of Freight
https://www.nytimes.com/2023/12/28/business/energy-environment/electric-trucks-port-california.html

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Sports Briefs---

Favorite Sports Moments of 2023
https://www.theringer.com/year-in-review/2023/12/28/24017466/favorite-best-sports-moments-list-year-in-review

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California News Briefs---

Oakland mayor rejects all police chief finalists,
setting back city’s search
https://www.eastbaytimes.com/2023/12/27/oakland-mayor-rejects-all-finalists-for-vacant-police-chief-position/

Dramatic flooding in Santa Cruz County
as storm breaches coastline
https://www.sfgate.com/weather/article/santa-cruz-flooding-esplanade-seacliff-18578344.php

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Gimme that Wine

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EJnQoi8DSE8

Anthony Dias Blue; The Wine World Mourns
The Loss of a Publishing Titan
https://www.mensjournal.com/wine/the-wine-world-mourns-loss-of-a-publishing-titan

Beer sales plunge to lowest levels in 24 years
— thanks to Bud Light’s disastrous Dylan Mulvaney campaign
https://nypost.com/2023/12/27/business/beer-sales-plummeting-to-lowest-level-in-24-years-amid-dylan-mulvaney-fiasco/

Best of Unfiltered 2023
Wine Spectator
https://www.winespectator.com/articles/best-of-unfiltered-2023

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