FIS CFO James Kehoe to Step Down in November 2026

James Kehoe will leave the chief financial officer seat at FIS on November 5, 2026, the fintech company announced today. The departure ends a three-year run that spanned the Worldpay exit and the Issuer Solutions acquisition.

Kehoe will not disappear at once. He stays on as a non-executive senior advisor through March 2027, a buffer designed to hand over responsibilities without disruption.

Alexandra Brooks takes the interim CFO title on the same November 5 date. She keeps her current job too — Executive Vice President and Chief Accounting Officer — and will work closely with Stephanie Ferris, FIS Chief Executive Officer and President.

Who is Alexandra Brooks?

Brooks joined FIS in October 2024 as EVP and Chief Accounting Officer. Her record reads like a CFO pipeline. At Hertz Global Holdings she served as Chief Accounting Officer, then interim CFO, then earned the permanent CFO title. Before that she held finance, accounting and audit leadership roles at Aptiv PLC, General Electric and General Motors, spent time as Chief Financial Officer of Champion Windows and Home Exteriors, and began her career at PricewaterhouseCoopers. She is a Certified Public Accountant.

Ferris made the continuity argument directly. "Alex is a former public company CFO who knows our business, our controls and our finance team well, which makes her uniquely qualified to immediately step into the role of interim CFO," she said. "Her appointment provides continuity and stability while we conduct a comprehensive search for our next CFO."

The company has already opened that search. It will consider both internal and external candidates. No deadline was given.

What did Kehoe deliver?

Ferris credited him with three years of structural work. "On behalf of the Board of Directors and our entire team, I would like to thank James for his many contributions since he joined FIS in 2023," she said. "He played an instrumental role during a transformational period for our company, including the Worldpay exit and the Issuer Solutions acquisition, while sharpening our focus on disciplined capital allocation and cash generation."

That framing matters for finance readers. Kehoe arrived in 2023 and inherited a company mid-transformation. He leaves with the portfolio reshaped around payments and issuer processing, and with capital discipline cited as his mark by the CEO herself.

Kehoe struck a forward-looking note in his own statement. "I want to thank Stephanie, the Board and my colleagues across FIS for the opportunity to be part of this team over the past three years," he said. "FIS is well positioned for its next chapter, and I look forward to working with Alex and the finance team to ensure a seamless transition."

What happens between now and March 2027?

The timeline splits into two windows. From November 5, 2026, Brooks runs finance as interim CFO while Kehoe advises from a non-executive perch. After March 2027, Kehoe exits fully, by which point FIS intends to have a permanent CFO seated — whether promoted from within or hired from outside.

Ferris expressed confidence the machine keeps running. "Our finance organization is well equipped to continue executing our strategic and financial priorities during this transition period," she said.

For CFOs watching the succession play, the pattern is familiar: an insider with public-company CFO scars holds the chair, the search runs wide, and the advisor overlap buys roughly four months of safety margin.

The takeaway: FIS has a dated, staffed and bounded transition — not an abrupt vacancy.