Our board
Richard Longes, Chairman
Richard was appointed Chairman in 2005. He was Deputy Chairman of Lend Lease Corporation Limited and a Director from 1986 to 2006, and Chairman of MLC Ltd until 2000. He was also a Partner in leading law firm Freehills from 1971 to 1988 and a founding Principal of the corporate advisory and private equity group Wentworth Associates. Richard is presently Chairman of Austbrokers Ltd and a non-executive Director of Boral Ltd, Metcash Ltd and Investec Bank (Australia) Ltd. He has Arts and Law degrees from the University of Sydney and an MBA from the University of New South Wales, Australia.
Peter Hawkins, Director
Peter was appointed a Director of Liberty Financial in 2007. Prior to this, he spent 34 years at ANZ in a variety of senior roles. Peter is Director of Visa International, Treasury Corporation of Victoria, St George Bank Ltd, Mirvac Group Ltd, Clayton Utz and Camberwell Grammar School. With a Bachelor of Commerce and Administration (Honours) from Victoria University in Wellington, New Zealand, Peter is also a Fellow of the Australian Institute of Company Directors, Fellow of the Australian Institute of Bankers and is an Associate of the New Zealand Institute of Chartered Accountants.
Sherman Ma, Managing Director
Sherman is the founder and Managing Director of Liberty Financial. Since introducing specialty lending to Australia in 1997, Sherman has built the company to include operations across Australia and New Zealand with various business lines including residential mortgages, motor finance and commercial mortgages. Prior to establishing Liberty, Sherman worked at Credit Suisse First Boston in Wall Street’s Mortgage Backed Securities and Asset Backed Securities team. He also worked with McKinsey & Company. Sherman has an MBA from the Wharton School and was first-in-class in Economics and Operations Research from the University of Pennsylvania, USA.
Peter Rollason, Executive Director
Peter joined Liberty as an Executive Director in 2006. He was formerly a partner and national leader of the Banking and Finance practice of Deloitte Australia, one of the world’s largest professional services firms. Prior to Deloitte, Peter held senior executive operational positions with a number of major financial institutions including Salomon Smith, NatWest Markets and Kleinwort Benson. Peter began his banking career with Midland Bank International Division, now HSBC. Peter has a Bachelor of Science (Hons) from Liverpool University, United Kingdom, and is a qualified chartered accountant.
