Christos Stefanidis joins Alantra in its Athens office

After sixteen years at Big Four firm PwC, Christos Stefanidis has joined Alantra as a Managing Director. 

Stefanidis becomes a member of Alantra’s Alantra’s Credit Portfolio Advisory team. This practice helps banks, non-bank lenders and credit investors with the structuring and execution of deals, as part of their endeavours to optimise their credit portfolios.

Alantra’s Credit Portfolio Advisory practice has a presence in the UK, Spain, Ireland, Italy, Portugal, Greece, Brazil and China, and has advised on over 90 transactions for a total volume of over €62 billion in the last two years. 

The firm’s Athens team consists of ten professionals, serving the Greece and Cyprus markets, led by partner Vasilis Kosmas and senior advisor Kyriacos Riris. Newly appointed Stefanidis now joins the duo in Greece’s leadership team. 

Stefanidis previously worked for 16 years at PwC, latterly as a Director in its Corporate Finance team, focusing on financial services transactions (including leading some of the largest NPL sales and credit servicer carve out transactions), with experience in the local market and across Central and Eastern Europe.

He has extensive experience in M&A sell/buy-side advisory, loan portfolio valuation, sell/buy side advisory and corporate debt restructuring, with a focus on clients in the financial services space. Stefanidis also advised Greek banks on financial engineering amid the stress tests conducted by European Central bank.

According to Kosmas, the hire comes at a pivotal time for banks, non-bank lenders and credit investors in the region, with the onset of Covid-19 set to exacerbate balance sheet optimisation.

Alongside credit portfolio advisory, Alantra also supports its clients with investment banking, merger & acquisition advisory and alternative asset management services to companies and investors operating in the mid-market segment.