Alvarez & Marsal (A&M), the global independent professional services firm, announced the appointment of Fernando de la Mora as a managing director in its Financial Industry Advisory Services practice. Based in Madrid, de la Mora also becomes Region Head for Alvarez & Marsal in Spain and Portugal.

de la Mora specializes in providing advice to financial institutions in the areas of capital, stress testing and risk management and he will be leading A&M’s European service offering in those areas.Having overseen the Lehman Brothers bankruptcy and played a leading role in the restructuring of banks and banking systems across Europe, Alvarez & Marsal has been addressing issues raised by the financial crisis since its beginning. The firmhas successfully advised both individual institutions and governments in the restructuring of banks in Greece, Ireland, Iceland and Cyprus. In Spain, A&M advised the Fund for Orderly Bank Restructuring in relation to the creation of Sareb, the country’s ‘bad bank.’

de la Mora brings more than 20 years of experience conducting a wide variety of risk, capital, strategic planning and M&A advisory projects. His former clients include global financial services firms, investment banks, regional banks, insurance companies, asset managers and hedge funds.

Prior to joining A&M, he was a partner at PwC in New York where he led a practice of more than 350 professionals providing consulting services in risk management and regulatory advice. In addition, Mr. de la Mora has helped implement U.S. CCAR stress test guidelines to 13 of the 19 banks involved in the capital planning process led by the Federal Reserve.

In the area of risk management, de la Mora has served as an adviser to the Board of several major banks and insurance companies to strengthen risk governance and enterprise risk anagement practices in the context of lessons learned from the credit crisis.

Peter Briggs, Global Practice Leader of A&M’s Financial Industry Advisory Services, said: “With his considerable experience instress testing and quantitative analytics in particular, Fernando de la Mora’s arrival will allow A&M to better supportEuropean banks in addressing the complex issues of regulatory capital strength. We are delighted to have added a professional of Fernando’s calibre to advise our Spanish and European financial institution clients.”

Fernando de la Mora, Region Head for Alvarez & Marsal in Spain and Portugal, added: “With the next round of ECB stress tests coming in 2014, the European banking industry and its regulators will focus on forward-looking capital adequacy assessments under severe systemic and idiosyncratic conditions. Stress tests will become yet another financial constraint for the banks together with leverage, capital and liquidity rules being implemented as part of Basel III. This raft of supranational regulations and scrutiny will impact banks’ business models and continue to present restructuring and optimization opportunities. In my new role at A&M, I look forward to helping clients react quickly and strategically to the rapid pace of change across Europe.”

de la Mora began his career with Banco Santander in Spain. He earned a bachelor’s degree in business and economics from CUNEF in Madrid. He also earned an MBA from University of Michigan and a master’s degree in e-business from Instituto de Empresa. He also holds certification in strategic planning from INSEAD.