Business
Michael Pugh new Carver CEO as Deborah Wright steps down
Carver Bancorp, the nation’s largest bank founded and run by African Americans has announced that CEO Deborah Wright, who has run the bank since 1999, is stepping aside at year’s end.
Wright, 56 will be succeeded by Michael Pugh, 43, who happens to be the bank’s current president and chief operating officer. Wright, is to remain as chairperson.
Ms. Wright successfully ran the bank during the financial crisis of 2008 – 2011 and through her leadership, the bank was able to withstand the worst of the troubled period by getting rid of troubled loans. The new CEO is now tasked with ensuring that the Harlem-based institution is consistently profitable.
According to both Wright and Pugh, Carver Bancorp will step up efforts to serve more low-income New Yorkers who do not have bank accounts and also serve more businesses, including those that are not ready to fill out traditional loan applications.
“There’s a real opportunity for us to focus on small business customers in our community,” Pugh added.
Wright praised her successor for bringing “new vigor” and encouraging the institutions’s managers to get out of their branches and talk to customers and potential customers. She said she hoped her successor would learn from her big mistake: making too many construction loans to developers.
Wright said her experience as housing commissioner during the Rudy Giuliani administration had led her to believe that the government would provide sufficient subsidies and support to prevent the loans from going bad during an economic slowdown.
But her assumption proved wrong. As a result, Carver Bancorp lost US$63 million in 2011 and 2012. Ultimately, she was able to keep the bank alive by raising cash from Goldman Sachs and other Wall Street firms.
