Former lender CEO joins PEXA

The new CCCO has experience across banking and financial services, having held senior roles at Bank First (where she was acting chief operating officer and head of lending operations between 2020 and 2022); ME Bank (where she was general manager operations excellence [2018–20]); and NAB (where she held a range of positions over 24 years, including head of operations and strategy execution [2017–18], head of migrant banking [2016–17], and head of product management – lenders mortgage insurance [2016–17]).

In her new position, Waldock will focus on strengthening PEXA’s relationships across its ecosystem, drawing on her experience in partnerships, lending, and commercial leadership and “ensuring that customers remain central to PEXA’s strategy”.

Meanwhile, Peter Bonney has been appointed as PEXA’s new chief product and technology officer, commencing January 2026.

He will take over the position from Eglantine Etiemble, PEXA’s current group chief technology officer, who will depart the business on 26 November.

Bonney is currently the executive general manager, product engineering at Xero, where he leads the team responsible for scaling platforms that serve millions of customers globally.

He also brings extensive technology leadership experience from senior roles at Coles (where he was general manager, technology, engineering, and data [2017–21]) and IAG, where he was acting chief digital officer (2017).

PEXA noted the incoming leader’s “deep expertise in digital transformation and platform delivery across complex, regulated industries”.

The technology company has also elevated three of its existing leaders into new roles, appointing:

• Clare Gill as chief regulatory and corporate affairs officer.

• Krystle Kocik as group chief product officer to lead global product innovation.

• Steve Braithwaite as new general manager, new markets and group strategy, where he will focus on developing the company’s anti-money laundering (AML) solution and exploring new growth opportunities.

PEXA said that the refreshed leadership approach would bring PEXA’s technology and product functions together and will support the business’ innovation agenda, focused on enhancing its products and platform and the expansion and scaling of its platform into new markets.

Russell Cohen, PEXA’s CEO and group managing director, said that the appointments all bring specific skills that would underpin the group’s long-term growth agenda.

“These appointments reflect our commitment to putting the customer at the heart of everything we do, while driving the technology innovation needed to take PEXA into its next phase of growth,” he said.

“Peter’s demonstrated leadership in globally scaling technology platforms and Kylie’s deep Customer and Commercial expertise in banking and finance bring fresh perspective to PEXA, while Steve’s strength in strategy and innovation, Clare’s regulatory leadership and Krystle’s product depth will all be pivotal in shaping PEXA’s future.”

The company also thanked outgoing group chief technology officer Etiemble for her “significant contribution” and wished her “every success in the future”.

PEXA under the microscope

The leadership changes come as PEXA faces ongoing scrutiny for its e-conveyancing monopoly, with the federal Senate economics references committee currently in the midst of an inquiry into micro-competition opportunities in e-conveyancing and the NSW government undertaking a separate inquiry to review competition reforms in electronic conveyancing.

Both the federal and NSW inquiries are considering what changes, if any, are required to drive competition in e-conveyancing, given that PEXA was the original player in e-conveyancing and holds a monopoly.

While PEXA originally started as a cross-government initiative, it was sold by state governments to private owners before listing on the Australian Stock Exchange in 2021. It processes around $1 trillion in property transactions a year and has completed its national network after launching in the Northern Territory in August.

However, in the past few years, there has been a push by government to open up competition in Australia’s e-conveyancing market by allowing different electronic lodgment network operators (ELNOs) to transact seamlessly with each other.

Under the model, practitioners could subscribe to the ELNO of their choice (for example, by using Sympli and LEXTECH) and still complete transactions with parties using other platforms. The framework was scheduled to be ready by 31 December 2025.

Despite this, the initiative has faced repeated setbacks, not least because the banks had concerns with its proposed functionality, and PEXA believes the settlement-related features built to service financial institutions are its intellectual property.

The whole regime was paused in June 2024 by the Australian Registrars’ National Electronic Conveyancing Council (ARNECC), while a review was undertaken. This was compounded in May, when LEXTECH – one of the two challengers to PEXA – withdrew from the scheme, citing a lack of economic viability for more ELNOs.

Since then, the calls to review competition have reignited, particularly following technical issues and outages that delayed some property settlements. Indeed, both the federal and NSW inquiries have been focusing on the efficacy of the current e-coveyancing system and the reported outages.

However, PEXA told the Senate last month that 99.83 per cent of more than 5 million settlements had successfully completed on the planned settlement date over the last five years.

It added that enhancements are being rolled out that will enable the system to be restored to service availability within four hours in the event of a disaster.

The Senate report is expected by 23 October 2025, while the NSW select committee on competition reforms in electronic conveyancing will hold its hearings in November.

[Related: PEXA seeks to recover interoperability cost]