Headquarters:

145 King Street West, Toronto, Ontario M5H 1J8

Year founded:

1977

Number of employees:

800+

Phone:

1 877 903 2133

Email:

inquiry.htc@hometrust.ca

Website:

hometrust.ca

LinkedIn:

linkedin.com/company/hometrustco

“Restructuring inherited and legacy positions is a particular strength of our firm because of our ability to carefully evaluate existing security positions”

Thomas Carhart, South Street Advisors LLC

Home Trust Company

Scott Wood

President and Chief Executive Officer

Amir Gorgi

Chief Financial Officer

Brian Leland

Executive Vice President, Mortgage Lending

Leadership

With over 30 years of experience in financial services, operations, and leadership, Scott Wood has held senior roles at Citigroup in both the US and Canada. In 2005, he was appointed president of CitiFinancial Canada and became CEO in 2015, where he led the company’s separation from OneMain Financial and steered it through the global financial crisis. Wood played a pivotal role in creating Fairstone Financial Inc. in 2017, overseeing its carve-out from Citigroup and transition to private equity. His leadership continued through Fairstone’s acquisition by Fairstone Bank of Canada, and he was integral to the merger of Home Trust and Fairstone Bank in 2024, establishing Canada’s leading alternative bank. Wood is a passionate advocate for community engagement, supporting financial literacy and local initiatives through partnerships with JA Canada and United Way, and he also serves on Fairstone Bank’s board of directors.

President and Chief Executive Officer

Scott Wood

With 25 years of experience in financial services, Amir Gorgi oversees all financial functions at Fairstone Bank, including accounting, taxation, treasury, and corporate development. Since joining in 2019, he has been instrumental in growing the bank from $1 billion in receivables and 75 employees to over $30 billion in receivables and 2,500 employees, driven by strategic acquisitions like Fairstone Financial and Home Trust. Gorgi has held senior roles at RBC, TD Bank, and Manulife. Outside of work, he co-founded “100 Guys Who Care Oakville” and serves as treasurer for the Jozo Weider Alpine Ski Club.

Chief Financial Officer

Amir Gorgi

With 25 years of experience in mortgage lending, Brian Leland leads the residential and commercial mortgage lines of business, focusing on both strategic goals and day-to-day operations. He has built his career on driving business growth, operational excellence, and sound risk management. Leland started his journey at Home Trust in 2001 as an underwriter and quickly advanced to become one of the first business development managers. Over 17 years at Equitable Bank, he helped grow its mortgage business from a localized alternative lender into a national, multi-product institution. Leland returned to Home Trust in 2021, holding various senior roles, including senior vice president of residential underwriting and executive vice president of residential lending, where he oversees sales, business development, underwriting, operations, and portfolio management. He holds a Bachelor of Science from McGill University and a Bachelor of Commerce from Concordia University.

Executive Vice President, Mortgage Lending

Brian Leland

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Grant Wyard-Scott

Chief Operating Officer

With over 35 years of experience in consumer lending and operations, Grant Wyard-Scott leads enterprise services, customer care, collections, and the automobile financing and direct lending business lines at Fairstone Bank. He specializes in optimizing cost structures and driving operational efficiency. Wyard-Scott has played a key role in modernizing operations, improving branch experiences, reducing overhead costs, and streamlining processes within the Canadian consumer lending industry. A strong advocate for diversity and inclusion, he serves as the executive sponsor of Fairstone Bank’s Women’s Committee, promoting an inclusive workplace culture. Wyard-Scott holds a diploma in business administration from the Northern Alberta Institute of Technology.

Chief Operating Officer

Grant Wyard-Scott

Emilie Boulay

Senior Vice President, Card Services

With over 20 years of experience in consumer payments, financing, and business strategy, Emilie Boulay has deep expertise in both B2B and B2C services within the finance industry. Since March 2024, she has served as chief card services officer at Fairstone Bank, overseeing the strategy, growth, portfolio, and sales of credit cards, rewards programs, and retail financing. Boulay has been a key driver of Fairstone’s growth, securing significant retail partnerships and expanding the company’s retail business since joining in 2019. Prior to Fairstone, she spent nearly 11 years at Desjardins, leading sales and business strategy initiatives as a senior advisor.

Senior Vice President, Card Services

Emilie Boulay

Home Trust Company (“Home Trust”), a trusted subsidiary of Fairstone Bank of Canada (“Fairstone Bank”), specializes in residential and non-residential mortgage lending, along with a range of credit card services. In addition, Home Trust and its subsidiary, Home Bank, provide a variety of deposit products through brokers and directly to consumers via the well-regarded Oaken Financial brand. With a rich history of excellence, Fairstone Bank and its subsidiaries stand as Canada’s leading provider of alternative lending solutions. Discover more about their services and offerings at HomeTrust.ca and FairstoneBank.ca.

“Our disciplined investment process helps position our clients to reap the benefits of rising securities markets at an appropriate level of risk”

Thomas Carhart, South Street Advisors LLC

Anne C. Sapienza, CRPC®

Partner, Financial Advisor

Jennifer Von Ruden

Partner, Chief Compliance Officer, HR Director

Brad Carroll

Director of Operations

Liane Brown

Partner

Since he was a child, the financial markets have fascinated Anne C. Sapienza and very often her grandparents would give her stocks as holiday gifts. They would sit together, pouring over the financial pages of the newspaper, watching the progress of her investments, as she learned the importance of planning for the future by saving and investing. This is the same one-on-one approach she takes with all of her clients. Sapienza enjoys anything that takes her outdoors. She has a passion for service and is a member of the Ambassadors of Generous Giving Board of the National Christian Foundation. She and her husband, Tim, reside in Summit, WI.

Partner, Financial Advisor

Anne C. Sapienza, CRPC®

IAG is an extension of Jennifer Von Ruden’s family. She is proud to work for an organization that truly cares about its employees and clients. She enjoys collaborating with the dedicated team of professionals that IAG has built. Each person has their specialty and they all come together as a team to provide exceptional services to their clients. Von Ruden is proud to say that IAG genuinely looks out for its clients’ best interest and assists them in pursuing their dreams and financial goals. She and her husband, Jason, and their two daughters live in the Village of Dousman.

Partner, Chief Compliance Officer, HR Director

Jennifer Von Ruden

As the leader of the operations team, Brad Carroll is responsible for ensuring that every client receives the best experience possible. He works closely with his team to keep them informed of any regulatory and procedural changes. As the leader of the operations team, he is responsible for ensuring that every client receives the best experience possible. He works closely with his team to keep them informed of any regulatory and procedural changes. Carroll trains each team member in the fine art of building solid client-advisor relationships. They work together with the advisors to synthesize complex strategies and fulfill many needs for their clients and the firm. He loves the people he works with and considers them a second family. Anyone who works with them would feel like family, too.

Director of Operations

Brad Carroll

Liane Brown is committed to representing individuals who have suffered serious personal injuries and to families who have suffered the loss of a loved one. Her practice concentrates on personal injury law, including accident benefits, motor vehicle collisions, medical malpractice, occupiers’ liability, product liability and wrongful death cases.

Partner

Liane Brown

Partner

Liane Brown

Ben Irantalab enjoys the complexities of personal injury litigation. His practice is exclusively devoted to representing clients with brain injuries, spinal cord injuries, and severe orthopedic injuries. For him, the cases that require special creativity and thinking outside the box are the most gratifying.

Partner

Ben Irantalab

On a larger scale, HSH handles class action and mass tort lawsuits representing groups of people injured by dangerous products, medications, medical devices, and negligent organizations. The HSH team is known for providing caring and attentive service to clients, and is proud of the firm’s excellent reputation within the legal and medical communities.

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“We will continue to strengthen our service proposition and customer experience as a key differentiator, as we build on the momentum we have achieved to date across multiple business lines and territories,” says McLean. “Our im is to continue to grow our market relevance and strengthen our partnerships with our strategic brokers as we expand our leadership position in key sectors. “We will also continue to invest in talent. We are committed to drawing from the broadest pools of talent, and to creating an environment that attracts and retains stellar employees. We recognise the importance of building teams that are diverse, collaborative, and innovative and are dedicated to cultivating a supportive and inclusive workplace culture in which all our employees can thrive.”

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Partner

Ben Irantalab

Partner

Ben Irantalab

Partner

Liane Brown

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Management liability

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Turnaround time – claims

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Stephen Kerr

Chief Executive Officer, Asia

Nicki Dunn

Chief Client Officer

Nigel Cook

Chief Executive Officer, Singapore Head of Major Complex Loss, Asia

John Law

Chief Executive Officer, China

Alexa Tang

Chief Executive Officer, Hong Kong

Aldrin Wong

Chief Executive Officer and Managing Director, Malaysia

Andri Dirgantara

President Director, Indonesia

Pam Chhabra

Manager – Residential Strata

Adam Basaldella

Manager – Claims

Adam Basaldella

Manager – Claims

Nuts and bolts Along with extensive training in the algorithms used in South Street’s investment process, the firm’s analysts and portfolio managers are taught the fundamentals of business and financial analysis. While most firms are moving toward the use of third-party mutual funds and ETFs in portfolio construction, South Street possesses this research capability, and it also has the ability to identify undervalued investment opportunities that fit its clients’ financial picture. Carhart comments, “For instance, restructuring inherited and legacy positions is a particular strength of our firm because of our ability to carefully evaluate existing security positions.” What has inspired clients to remain with South Street for so long is the firm’s holistic approach that applies the same investment criteria to allocation decisions across multiple asset classes and security selection for equities, bonds, and other publicly traded instruments. The firm’s portfolios only hold individual securities that have been fully vetted and researched by its experienced investment team. Several algorithms are employed to identify purchase candidates in the yield, growth, and technology sectors. Depending on their income and risk profiles, clients often hold a variety of securities, from traditional common stocks and bonds to publicly traded master limited partnerships and gold-bullion-backed ETFs. “While securities are drawn from a universe of over 19,000 companies, we are a concentrated manager that typically holds 25 to 30 issues in our clients’ equity component,” says Carhart. “Candidates for in-depth fundamental business analysis must pass a set of rigorous screening criteria that have tended over time to be reliable indicators of future business and financial success.”

Meticulous onboarding The key building block in South Street’s process is earning the trust of all new clients by ensuring they and their advisors’ visions align. Early discussions focus on return expectations, income requirements, and risk tolerance. Carhart says, “Based on these conversations, we will model projected investment returns, income generation, and capital appreciation for a number of different portfolio mixes over a 10-year time frame. After further discussion, we agree on a set of guidelines that often are summarized in an investment policy statement. These guidelines are not static, but can change along with the client’s evolving financial picture.” Another fundamental of South Street’s approach is a give-and-take relationship between the firm and the client, which reinforces the trust critical to success. “In our view, talk about trust and personal relationships means little if a client doesn’t see market-beating gains in portfolio value over time. Our disciplined investment process helps position our clients to reap the benefits of rising securities markets at an appropriate level of risk,” says Carhart. Due to its longevity, record of success, and satisfied clientele, South Street is a firm comfortable in its own skin. Its team knows who they are and will continue to do so.

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“At the end of the day, many individual wealth managers tout personal service, custom portfolio management, and responsiveness, but few can match South Street Advisors’ record of wealth creation since its inception 26 years ago.”

Stephen Owen, South Street Advisors LLC