Meet & Greet

Daniel Cantara's Successful Debut

John Koelmel, the president and CEO of First Niagara Financial Group, did not do much talking at the investor conference that Keefe Bruyette & Woods hosted in Boston in February. "I'm the set-up guy today," he said, before introducing Daniel Cantara, who had been promoted to the new role of chief banking officer just two months earlier.

Cantara handled the bulk of the presentation, along with CFO Greg Norwood. Chatting later, Cantara confessed that it was his first time doing an investor presentation, but you never would have been able to tell.

Previously, Cantara ran First Niagara's Commercial Services Group since 2007 and had led its financial services businesses, including insurance and wealth management, since 2001, when he joined the company. In his new role, he leads all customer-facing businesses, which adds consumer finance and retail banking to his oversight of the commercial operation.

Cantara describes himself as "a bottom-line kind of guy" who will facilitate a more nimble response to business opportunities. Recent initiatives at the $36 billion-asset First Niagara include the launch of mobile banking (with 53,000 app downloads in the first four weeks) and a drive to increase credit-card penetration with retail customers (to 30 percent, from the current 17 percent).

That's a First!

Mark Cardone and Michael McGrover are not only first senior vice presidents at Center Bancorp-they're the first first senior vice presidents at the company, which owns Union Center National Bank in Union, N.J. In their newly created roles, Cardone, who was SVP for retail banking services, will add oversight of private banking and wealth management to his list of responsibilities, while McGrover, who also had been an SVP, oversees lending. Cardone has been with the bank since 2001, following posts at Summit Bank and Fleet Bank in northern New Jersey. McGrover just joined Center last year from Spencer Savings Bank, where he had been a VP for commercial and industrial lending.

Sunshine State

Alex Sink is back in banking. The 26-year B of A veteran, who retired as president of its Florida operations in 2000, was CFO of the Sunshine State from 2007 to 2011. (She also was the Democratic Party's nominee for governor in 2010, losing to Republican Rick Scott by less than 1 percent of the votes cast.) Now she has joined the board of the $937 million-asset C1 Bank in St. Petersburg, Fla.

Sink has been a mentor to several C1 Bank officials, including its president, Katie Pemble, and its COO, Rita Lowman. She brings "totally unique" experiences to the board that'll be valuable in C1's next stage of growth, CEO Trevor Burgess says.

Sink also serves as an advisor to Hyde Park Capital, an investment bank in Tampa, and chairs the Florida Next Foundation, a nonprofit group she founded that aims to diversify the state's economy by spurring entrepreneurship.

Go Direct-ly to CEO

Patriot National Bancorp in Stamford, Conn., had to look for a new CEO when Christopher Maher resigned in late February, but it didn't have to look very long, or very far. Concurrent with the announcement that Maher was leaving (he took a job as president and COO of the $2.3 billion-asset OceanFirst Financial in Toms River, N.J.), Patriot said that Kenneth T. Neilson, a director at Patriot since 2010, would become CEO of the $618 million-asset company.

Patriot Chairman Michael Carrazza said he wasn't thinking about a CEO backup plan when he recruited Neilson to the board three years ago as the company embarked on a recapitalization. But he calls Neilson a natural fit as CEO "since he's got the requisite skill and he's so integrated with the operations of the bank."