Huntington Bancshares Inc.’s recent promotion of Brant Standridge to the role of president hands the longtime bank executive more oversight of the business and sets him up to take over whenever Chief Executive Officer Steve Steinour opts to step back.

Standridge, who joined the Columbus, Ohio-based company in 2022 as the president of consumer and regional banking, has played a key role at the lender, spearheading the bank’s most recent acquisitions of Cadence Bank and Veritex Holdings Inc.

Standridge was given responsibility for pursuing the deals at a time when Steinour, 68, and Huntington’s board had started searching for potential CEO candidates about two years ago. Standridge, 50, had led the due diligence and integration of the two deals successfully, which helped him win the board’s support for his latest promotion.

“We’re in a budget season for the first time on a combined basis,” Steinour said in a joint interview with Standridge. “It gives Brant the opportunity to plan and chart the revenue growth for the company for the next year, and frankly through the decade along with our other colleagues.”

In his new role, Standridge will lead Huntington’s three major business lines, including consumer and regional banking, which includes wealth management, mortgage and its more than 1,600 branches. He’ll also oversee commercial banking, including the capital markets business, as well as the payments unit. Scott Kleinman, president of Huntington’s commercial bank, and Amit Dhingra, the firm’s chief enterprise payments officer, will report to Standridge.

Huntington is likely to promote another person to lead the consumer and regional banking unit under Standridge next year, Steinour said.

Before joining Huntington, Standridge worked at Truist Financial Corp. and its predecessor BB&T Corp. He worked on Truist’s executive management team after the bank’s formation.

Standridge’s promotion, announced Tuesday, was effective immediately. Huntington said that Steinour, who’s worked at CEO of the bank since 2009, plans to continue in that role for “several more years.”

Succession Plans

Steinour’s tenure began in the depths of the financial crisis. At that time, Huntington grappled with mounting credit losses from an ill-timed acquisition of a company that had ties to a mortgage lender right before the housing market started to collapse. Steinour sought to strengthen Huntington’s risk management, and has led the firm’s expansion beyond its foothold in the Midwest.

Huntington is the latest regional bank that’s been mapping out a succession plan, readying a new generation of leaders to replace a cohort of bankers that led firms through the financial crisis.

Just this month, Truist appointed Mike Lyons to take the CEO helm, succeeding longtime CEO Bill Rogers. Earlier this year, Citizens Financial Group Inc. CEO Bruce Van Saun told Bloomberg News that he views Brendan Coughlin as his most likely successor, without specifying a timeline for his retirement. Last year, Gunjan Kedia became the CEO of U.S. Bancorp.