Valley National Bancorp on Monday announced the appointment of Curt Lang as its new chief banking officer for New Jersey. In this crucial role, Lang will be responsible for leading the strategic direction and accelerating the growth of Valley’s commercial banking portfolio across the state.
Lang joins Valley with a proven record of success in the tri-state financial market. He previously served as senior vice president and regional head of Commercial Banking for New Jersey at M&T Bank, where his leadership helped the region consistently achieve top-quartile performance in growth, profitability and client engagement.
“Curt comes to Valley with a proven track record achieving commercial growth in New Jersey,” Gino Martocci, senior executive vice president and president of Commercial Banking for Valley Bank said. “His deep market expertise and commitment to helping businesses succeed align perfectly with Valley’s relationship banking philosophy.”
Lang’s career also includes significant leadership and relationship management roles at Citizens Bank of Pennsylvania, Provident Bank, and SouthTrust Bank.
“I’m thrilled to join Valley at such an exciting time for the bank’s commercial growth,” Lang said. “New Jersey has an incredibly dynamic business community, and I look forward to leveraging my local relationships and leadership experience to help our clients and teams thrive.”
This appointment is part of Valley’s broader commercial banking expansion strategy, which recently included key hires such as Matthew Verney, chief banking officer for the Philadelphia and South Jersey markets, and Terry Keating, head of asset-based lending. These additions collectively reinforce the bank’s commitment to growing its commercial platform and capabilities across critical geographic and business segments.
Lang holds a Master of Science in Management from the University of Alabama in Huntsville and a Bachelor of Science in Economics from Salisbury University.
The appointment of a key commercial leader in New Jersey comes amid ongoing discussions regarding significant challenges in the state’s health care system, particularly concerning patient access to cancer care. Oncologists, patient advocates, and lawmakers are wrestling with how to balance insurer cost containment with timely, clinically appropriate treatment. The issues driving this debate include:
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Impact of Prior Authorization (PA) Delays: Nationwide data shows that nearly all oncologists report treatment delays due to PA, with over two-thirds reporting an average delay of five days or more. These delays are linked to adverse clinical consequences, including disease progression and, in some cases, patient death.
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Administrative Burden: Prior authorization compliance consumes significant resources at New Jersey cancer centers and physician practices, diverting staff time away from direct patient care. One study estimated the cost for a single PA transaction to be around $6 per transaction for physician practices nationally.
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Legislative Solutions: New Jersey has been active in regulatory reform. A new state law is set to go into effect in 2026 that requires insurance carriers to decide on urgent PA requests within 24 hours and non-urgent requests within 72 hours (for state-regulated plans). Furthermore, a bill was recently signed into law requiring state-regulated insurers to cover biomarker testing, a critical step for accessing precision cancer medicine.
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Step Therapy Concerns: Oncologists continue to raise concerns over “step therapy” protocols that mandate patients fail on a less-effective, lower-cost drug before gaining access to a prescribed, optimal treatment, a practice particularly harmful when dealing with specific, aggressive cancer mutations.
