Africa’s Standard Bank has taken on a number of new hires to expand the bank’s Johannesburg structured trade and commodity finance (STCF) business.

Jeffrey Midzuk has joined the STCF team as a director.

Midzuk has more than 15 years’ experience in originating, structuring and implementing structured trade, project and export finance transactions across the mining, power, infrastructure and telecoms sectors.

He joins Standard Bank from Standard Chartered, where he was director of project and export finance.

Chartered accountant Ryan Stokes has also joined the bank’s STCF operation.

Before joining the bank, Stokes worked across a number of sectors such as mining, manufacturing, logistics and media through leveraged finance transactions including senior, mezzanine and equity funding.

Stokes has also managed a number of restructurings with various clients.

“We are delighted with the addition of new hires into our team in Johannesburg.”

Frances Geldenhuys has also joined the team and brings with her more than 8 years’ experience.

Before working at Standard Bank, Geldenhuys served at South Africa’s Absa Bank and Rand Merchant Bank in a number of commodity finance-related divisions such as treasury and country and credit risk.

Finally, David Kaplan has been shifted to the STCF team after joining Standard Bank in 2006.

“We are delighted with the addition of new hires into our team in Johannesburg. We are seeing strong deal flow and believe that the addition of experienced professionals provides us with the skills and capabilities to provide trade finance solutions to our clients in key sectors both in South Africa and the rest of Africa,” Megan McDonald, head of STCF at the bank, tells GTR.