Benoist de Vimal joined Mitsubishi UFJ Financial Group as director and head of origination for aviation in the Americas.

Based in New York, de Vimal will report to Olivier Trauchessec, co-head of global aviation at MUFG, and be responsible for managing aviation originations, including supporting MUFG’s originate-to-distribute business model through capital markets and syndication, and facilitating cross-selling with MUFG’s product partners.

The appointment of de Vimal dovetails with the recent appointment of Yezdan Badrakhan to head of U.S. esoteric ABS for MUFG. Badrakhan joined from Morgan Stanley to lead MUFG’s business underwriting bonds backed by unusual assets such as aircraft, railcar and shipping containers.

de Vimal has more than 15 years of investment banking experience with specialized expertise in originating aircraft structured finance, risk management and debt restructuring. He joined MUFG from Natixis, where he held multiple positions and was most recently a senior member of the aviation group, holding responsibility for arranging, syndicating and restructuring a variety of aircraft finance transactions.