Shanka Abeywardene new CFO at SDB bank

SDB bank has announced the appointment of Shanka Abeywardene as its new Chief Financial Officer and DGM Finance and Planning with effect from 5 September.

Shanka brings with him over 30 years of experience in the financial services industry in Sri Lanka and overseas. He has a proven track record of setting up new business lines, and effective business partnering fostering overall organisational growth, and as a member of SDB bank’s senior management team, Shanka’s expertise and experience are expected to help the bank better navigate the promising but uncertain economic future ahead for Sri Lanka and its SMEs. 

He started his career at Standard Chartered Bank Sri Lanka and has since held multiple roles at increasing levels of seniority in the financial services industry. His experience covers Strategy, F&P, Data warehousing and BI, ALCO and Treasury management, Asset Management and Private Banking.

During his career, he has served at Standard Chartered Bank, UAE, Mashreq Bank UAE, Bank Sarasin Alpen, UAE, Alpen Capital Group, Janashakthi Insurance PLC and NDB Bank PLC. He has also carried out consultancy assignments at Mashreq Bank and Al Rajhi Bank KSA. His non-financial services experience includes United Motor PLC and Touchwood PLC. Shanka was the AVP Corporate Planning and Business Intelligence at NDB Bank PLC prior to joining SDB bank

A management accountant by profession, Shanka is a Fellow of the Chartered Institute of Management Accountants (UK) and holds an MSc in Auditing, Management Accounting and IS from SKEMA (Fr). He also holds an Executive Diploma in Management from the University of Cambridge (UK), a Certificate in Islamic Finance from the Chartered Institute of Management Accountants (UK) and is a Member of the Chartered Institute for Securities and Investments (UK) He has an intermediate level diploma from the Association of Institute of Bankers (Sri Lanka).