BayFirst names loan production star president of SBA unit

St. Petersburg-based BayFirst promoted Christopher Hackney to president of lending for Small Business Administration and U.S. Department of Agriculture within the bank's government-guaranteed lending division, known nationally as CreditBench, the bank says in a news release.

The bank says it is the No. 1 SBA lender in the Tampa Bay area and the nation's second-largest small business lender based on units. It has with $1.1 billion in assets, according to Federal Deposit Insurance Corp. data.

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Hackney is a 12-year banking industry veteran who began his career as a line teller at a community bank in Atlanta, BayFirst says. He joined BayFirst in April 2017, "quickly rising to the role of SVP and director of loan originations. In that role, the bank, in a statement, says "he led the bank to consecutive record-breaking years of production and vastly increased its overall impact on small businesses across the country."

Under Hackney, the team increased its SBA loan production from $170 million to $383 million in 2022, or 125%. And it surpassed $495 million in 2023, a 29% jump. Its loan production is up more than 560% since 2021, BayFirst says.

BayFirst National Bank is the principal subsidiary of BayFirst Financial, traded on Nasdaq as "BAFN." It operates 12 banking centers in the Tampa Bay area and opened in 1999.