Young Achiever winner Akshay Gupta on how a CMA win validates work and builds client trust
The Canadian Mortgage Awards are returning for 2026, once again bringing one of the most prestigious events in the mortgage calendar to Toronto – and with the industry-renowned ceremony now entering its 20th year, its impact on winners and attendees remains as profound as ever.
Just ask Akshay Gupta (pictured top), a commercial real estate mortgage agent at Foundry Mortgage Capital Corp. in Toronto and winner of last year’s Centum Financial Award for Young Achiever of the Year.
A rising star in the mortgage industry, Gupta had already been named an Excellence Awardee at the 2024 CMAs – but still, nothing could have prepared him for the moment when he was announced as the award’s overall winner the following year in front of an audience packed with industry peers.
“Having received the Excellence Award the year prior, I knew I was on the right track,” Gupta told Canadian Mortgage Professional this week, “but hearing my name called out as the outright winner was something different entirely.”
For winners, victory at the CMAs serves as a resounding endorsement of the hard work and sacrifice it takes to succeed in the mortgage industry.
Gupta viewed his win as an affirmation that carving out a path in the commercial mortgage sector was the right choice. “Commercial mortgage brokering is a relationship business built on trust, and when the industry formally recognizes the work you’re doing, it affirms that the approach you’ve committed to is the right one,” he said. “I felt enormous gratitude: to my clients, my lender partners, and everyone who has been part of this journey.”
The industry’s leading names and highest achievers fill each category at every year’s CMAs – making it an even more impressive accomplishment to come away with an award. As always, this year’s categories promise to feature a stellar list of candidates, with each award more fiercely competitive than ever.
“The calibre of professionals recognized by the CMAs is exceptional, and I never take that lightly,” Gupta said. “Each of those markets has its own lender landscape, its own underwriting logic, its own risks. To be recognized doing that breadth of work at that level of complexity carries real meaning.”
What a national win does for a broker’s business
Winning an award at the CMAs isn’t just a great achievement on the night – it’s a recognition that can have a tangible impact on business and reputation within the industry.
Gupta said he’s experienced that first-hand. “Developers and investors need confidence in their advisor from day one,” he said. “The CMA win signals that the work has been independently validated at a national level, which opens doors and shortens the trust-building process in a way that’s otherwise difficult to manufacture.”
In marketing and communications, it can prove an invaluable asset for mortgage professionals. “I reference it in my professional profile and in client conversations,” he said, “because people deserve to know the calibre of the professional structuring their deal.”
What to know about the 2026 awards
This year’s awards will take place on November 25 at Rebel Toronto, with nominations now open (closing August 14).
Mortgage professionals can nominate themselves or an industry peer across a range of different categories, with 26 in total this year including prestigious broker, lender, and underwriter awards.
For Gupta, the importance of the CMAs has never been clearer. “These ceremonies serve a purpose that’s easy to underestimate. They make outcomes visible,” he said.
“Behind every transaction in this industry is a real story: a developer bringing much-needed housing supply to market, a missing middle project adding density to an established neighbourhood, a senior housing facility securing stable long-term financing, a construction loan that transforms a piece of land into a thriving community asset. Those stories rarely surface publicly, and awards like these give them a platform.”
The competitive process, meanwhile, is also an important standard-setter. “When the industry can point to what excellence looks like in a given year, it raises the bar for everyone operating in this space,” he said.
Excellence Awardees for this year’s CMAs will be announced through CMP in September, with overall winners revealed at the November 25 gala. Don’t delay – if you’re a professional in the Canadian mortgage industry, be sure to nominate your outstanding colleagues and peers through the official Canadian Mortgage Awards website today.
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