Element Builds Structured Finance Team With the Recruitment of Senior Wall Street Veterans

TORONTO, ONTARIO--(Marketwired - Aug. 8, 2014) - Element Financial Corporation (TSX:EFN) ("Element" or the "Company") today announced the recruitment of a team of experienced structured finance veterans formerly with Credit Suisse Group. Together, this team has more than US$45 billion of experience structuring, investing and syndicating rail and aviation equipment finance transactions. The team's expertise includes transaction structuring for some of the world's largest transportation equipment lessors as well as syndicating rail lease pools and aircraft portfolios to US institutional investors. The team's investor base is principally comprised of US life insurance companies and includes more than 140 institutional investors participating in more than 60 transactions.

Based in Stamford, Connecticut, the team will seek advisory and transaction structuring mandates that capitalize on their extensive transportation equipment financing experience. A core focus of the team will be to structure and close third party funds holding transportation leased assets on behalf of institutional investors with Element acting as the fund manager. The structuring and management fees derived from these mandates will be incremental in 2015 to the net finance income Element earns from originating rail and aviation finance assets where the Company acts as a principal.

"Adding this capability provides Element with the opportunity to develop deeper relationships with existing rail and aviation clients at the same time that it allows us to provide services to a much broader range of transportation equipment manufacturers, lessors, operators and investors in both of these verticals," said David McKerroll, President of Element's rail and aviation finance business.

The acquired team consists of six professionals lead by Scott Corman whose background includes various award winning transactions many of which were completed in his 13 years as Head of the Transportation Asset Finance team at Credit Suisse AG in New York. As Element's Executive Managing Director, Scott will oversee Element's expansion into structured finance services in both the rail and aircraft markets.

In addition to Scott, Imran Hussein joins the Element team as Managing Director. Imran brings years of experience managing client relationships and capital raising for Credit Suisse, Merrill Lynch and Deutsche Bank. In his new role he will be responsible for sourcing and managing the team's funding relationships and the transaction syndication process.

David Center joins as Director and was a key member of the Transportation Asset Finance team at Credit Suisse AG and during his 11 year tenure played a key role in structuring and executing transactions for leading rail and aircraft lessors. He will oversee similar activities at Element for both direct investments as well as client/partner transactions.

Steve Marchi joins Element as Director from Credit Suisse AG's Transportation Asset Finance team where he spent the last 10 years. His background includes originating and structuring transactions in aviation and rail. While at Credit Suisse, he oversaw the execution of Element's first rail ABS transaction earlier this year.

Scott and his team, in addition to their expertise structuring transactions for the railcar industry, have provided structured advisory services to both civil and commercial aircraft lessors. While the team will continue to pursue these aviation mandates, Element will not be entering the market as a principal lessor of commercial aircraft.

"With clear line of site to surpass our $3.9 billion pre-PHH origination target for 2014, onboarding this experienced team of structured finance professionals allows Element to capture incremental fee income from the rail and aviation markets at the same time that we add leverage to our balance sheet from continued organic origination growth in each of our four verticals," added Steven K. Hudson, Element's Chairman and Chief Executive Officer.

About Element Financial Corporation

With total assets of $10 billion, Element Financial Corporation is one of North America's leading equipment finance companies. Element operates across North America in four verticals of the equipment finance market - Commercial & Vendor Finance, Aviation Finance, Railcar Finance and Fleet Management.

Forward-Looking Statements

This release includes forward-looking statements regarding Element and its business. Such statements are based on the current expectations and views of future events of Element's management. In some cases the forward-looking statements can be identified by words or phrases such as "may", "will", "expect", "plan", "anticipate", "intend", "potential", "estimate", "believe" or the negative of these terms, or other similar expressions intended to identify forward-looking statements. Forward-looking statements in this release include those related to Element's origination targets for 2014 and the expected incremental revenue to be generated from the acquired structured finance team. The forward-looking events and circumstances discussed in this release may not occur and could differ materially as a result of known and unknown risk factors and uncertainties affecting Element, including risks regarding the equipment finance industry, economic factors and many other factors beyond the control of Element. No forward-looking statement can be guaranteed. Forward-looking statements and information by their nature are based on assumptions and involve known and unknown risks, uncertainties and other factors which may cause our actual results, performance or achievements, or industry results, to be materially different from any future results, performance or achievements expressed or implied by such forward-looking statement or information. Accordingly, readers should not place undue reliance on any forward-looking statements or information. Except as required by applicable securities laws, forward-looking statements speak only as of the date on which they are made and Element undertakes no obligation to publicly update or revise any forward-looking statement, whether as a result of new information, future events, or otherwise.