The Commonwealth Bank of Australia (CBA) has revealed the senior leadership team for its commodities, trade and carbon unit in a move the lender says reflects its “significant growth agenda” in the three sectors.

The Sydney-based bank has hired Joe Arena as managing director for trade finance. In the newly created role, he will lead CBA’s strategy “across the institutional bank’s trade finance, working capital and supply chain finance business”, according to a statement.

Arena started in the role in September after finishing a 16-year stint at HSBC, where he was most recently country head of global trade and receivables finance for Australia.

Alongside Arena, the bank has also appointed Martyn Whitehead, who joins from Standard Chartered in London to head up commodities, Bradley Campbell as head of commodities trading and Yasmina Elshafei as head of global carbon.

All four are managing directors and report to Alex Toone, the incumbent executive general manager of the commodities, trade and carbon (CTC) unit, which was created in February this year.

“Our clients are navigating a volatile commodity price environment, challenging supply chains and the global transition to a low carbon economy – it’s more important than ever that we have the right skills, capabilities and people in place to provide the best level of support,” says Toone.

“These appointments reflect the significant growth agenda we have in CTC and the prioritisation of our key focus areas under our revised strategy.”

Andrew Hinchliff, CBA’s group executive for institutional banking and markets, adds: “Our new CTC business enhances our specialisation in these areas and help[s] us deliver even greater value to our clients by driving our capabilities to the next level.

“We are delighted to have secured an exceptional range of talent and expertise for the CTC leadership team.”