Our Story

We are FIRST BANK! After 18 yrs. of activity in Romania, Piraeus Bank was acquired by the J.C Flowers, a private equity leader, and it became First Bank. J.C. Flowers was established in 1998 and has invested more than 15 billion USD of capital in 52 portfolio companies, in 17 countries. Its activity is focused on global investments in the financial sector. First Bank has an American DNA, something you can see in the values we nourish, values that are American to the core: integrity, customer first, passion for sustainable results, teamwork, innovation, giving back. It is the way we chose to pursue. This is “The American way”.

TOP MANAGEMENT

Henk Paardekooper, President of the Executive Committee and Member of the Board of Directors FIRST BANK

Henk has close to thirty years of international banking experience at the Royal Bank of Scotland and ABN AMRO, including managing divisional, country and regional businesses, as well as assets and portfolios in widely diverse geographies and markets, with an emphasis on Central and Eastern Europe. He worked in Romania during 2011-2014 as Country Executive for the Royal Bank of Scotland.

Henk acquired a successful track record in business transformation and complex change programs including improvements in the commercial, financial and business performance of organizations relating to strategy development and implementation, M&A, restructuring, divestment, spin-offs and wind downs.

He operated productively in a wide range of corporate, cultural and geographical environments lived and worked in the Netherlands, United Kingdom, Russia and CIS, Romania, Poland, Czech Republic, Turkey, UAE and gained additional regional experience in Latin America.

Henk holds a Master of Science in Econometrics from the Erasmus University of Rotterdam.

TOP MANAGEMENT

Cosmin Ciobanu, Chief Risk Officer and Vice-President, First Bank

Cosmin has almost 18 years of experience as a professional in banking and financial services.

Before joining the First Bank team, Cosmin held top management positions with financial and banking entities, such as ProCredit Bank Romania and good.bee Credit IFN Romania.

For almost 4 years, Cosmin has been in the front lines of management, both as Deputy CEO with ProCredit Bank Romania and as CFO with good.bee Credit IFN Romania.

Cosmin has extensive experience in banking risk management, having dealt with area this as Head of Risk with Procredit Bank Romania and Germany.

Cosmin graduated the Academy of Economic Studies in Bucharest, School of Cybernetics, Statistics and Business Information Technology, and has a Master’s Degree in Management of Banking Systems awarded by the same University. He also attended a number of training courses in financial risk in Romania, Germany and Luxembourg

TOP MANAGEMENT

Razvan Filcescu, Vice-President with First Bank as well as non-executive member with the Board of Directors of Bank Leumi Romania.

He coordinates the Loan Division (the Departments of Assesment for Corporate, SMEs, Micro and Retail Loans as well as the Loand Fraud Prevention Department.)

Razvan Filcescu is a senior banking executive with 20 years of banking & financial experience. With a vast banking expertise in banks such as Procredit Bank and Credit Europe Bank, Razvan started as loan officer and firmly grew into a senior manager deeply involved into a commercial bank building process.

The last years were focused on corporate and commercial credit underwriting, early collection and workout activities.

Razvan graduated the Academy of Economic Studies, Bucharest, holding a B.Sc. in Banking and Stock Exchanges.

He also holds an MBA in Financial Management at City University of Seattle.

TOP MANAGEMENT

Mădălina Otilia Teodorescu, Vice-President First Bank

Vice-President - coordinates the bank's business and product development functions for Retail, Micro & PFA segments and supervises the operations of the entire branch network of the bank.

Mădălina has extensive expertise in sales and retail markets with a 23 years’ experience in the Romanian banking industry. Mădălina has previously been Deputy General Manager - Retail, Micro & PFA of Piraeus Bank Romania, Executive Manager – Sales & Distribution of Raiffeisen Bank Romania, and held managerial positions in product development & sales in CitiBank România S.A. and Banca Comercială Română.

Mădălina is a graduate of the Romanian-American University, School of Finance & Banking. Since 1996, Mădălina has continuously developed her professional career by attending international training programs in Geneva, Milan, Paris, Prague, Vienna, London and Lausanne.

TOP MANAGEMENT

Nikolaos Chaniotis, Vice-President First Bank

Vice-President - coordinates recovery operations for Business and Retail segments, as well as Real Estate Owned function of the Bank.

Nikolaos has extensive expertise in managing and restructuring non-performing loans, corporate banking and credit risk. With an international track record of 25 years’ of experience years in the recovery banking and active management sectors, Nikolaos has previously been Deputy General Manager – of Piraeus Bank Romania, and held a number of key positions within Tirana Bank, Uniastrum Bank - Russia, Bank of Cyprus, Arab Bank PLC - Athens, Piraeus Bank, Credit Lyonnais Greece.

Nikolaos holds a Master's Degree in Business Management, with a major on Finance with the University of Toledo, Ohio, and has a Bachelor's Degree in Economic Sciences with the Slippery Rock University, Pennsylvania.