Frederick Anderson Goodwin FRSE FCIBS (born 17 August 1958) is a Scottish chartered accountant and former banker who was Chief Executive Officer (CEO) of the Royal Bank of Scotland Group (RBS) between 2001 and 2009. From 2000 to 2008, he presided over RBS's rapid rise to global prominence as the world's largest company by assets (£1.9 trillion), and fifth-largest bank by stock market value and its even more rapid fall as RBS was forced into effective nationalisation in 2008. On 11 October 2008, Goodwin officially announced his resignation as chief executive and an early retirement, effective from 31 January 2009 – a month before RBS announced that its 2008 loss totalled £24.1 billion, the largest annual loss in UK corporate history. From January 2010, he was employed as a senior adviser to RMJM, an international architecture firm. He left the position after less than a year. Life and career Early career Born in Paisley, Renfrewshire, Goodwin is the son of a Scottish electrician and was the first of his family to go to university, attending Paisley Grammar School before studying law at Glasgow University. He joined accountants Touche Ross, and qualified as a chartered accountant in 1983. Between 1985 and 1987, he was part of a Touche Ross management consultant team at Rosyth Dockyard, and became a partner in Touche Ross in 1988. He was appointed a director of Short Brothers, and tasked with preparing the largest industrial employer in Northern Ireland for its 1989 privatisation. For Touche Ross he headed the worldwide liquidation of Bank of Credit and Commerce International after its collapse in July 1991. At 32, Goodwin was in charge of 1,000 people with teams from London to Abu Dhabi and the Cayman Islands that eventually returned over half the money from one of the most complicated, high-profile financial frauds ever. The extent of his role in the liquidation of Bank of Credit and Commerce International was questioned by finance journalist Ian Fraser. His move into banking came through his work at Touche Ross with the National Australia Bank, contributing due diligence to its 1987 takeover of Clydesdale Bank from the then Midland Bank and again with its 1995 takeover of Yorkshire Bank. During work on the latter he caught the eye of National Australia Bank executive Don Argus, and was invited to become deputy chief executive of Clydesdale in 1995, and as per his "five-second rule",