Chase ups business focus - Portland Business Journal:

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Gone are the brightlt colored signsproclaiming “Whoo hoo!” at every branch, replacedf by Chase’s more somber emphasis on strength and stabilitty through its “The Way Forward” Underpinning the marketing shifty is Chase’s effort to aggressively expand in areas that WaMu largely ignored. In an interviewe with the PortlandBusiness Journal, newlyy hired Pacific Northwest Chairwoman Phyllis Campbell outlinedc Chase’s Oregon strategy — which will result in new midsizee business services, additional wealth managemeny offerings, cuts to charitable givinyg and a more staid approach to branch-based Campbell, who was president of U.S.
Bank in Washington from 1991 to left the nonprofit Seattle Foundatioj in April tojoin Chase. She now travels regularly from Chase’sw Seattle office to Portland to meet with the fledging commerciaplbusiness team. The group, basede downtown, will provide services to businessesswith $5 million to $500 milliobn in annual revenue. In addition to large loans, it will offed cash management services that are now largely the purvieqw ofWells Fargo, Bank of America and U.S. Scheduled to open its doors by mid-September, the commercial businessz unit will face achallenging environment.
“So much of our and everybody’s success, will be tied to the recoveryu inthe economy,” Campbell said. “Becausse cash flow is so tight at many we don’t know how many deals we can Despite this challenge, Linda Navarro, president and CEO of the , applauded Chase’s expansion into commercial banking. “Going into this about 70 percent of the Uniter States credit market was not controlled bytraditionalp banks,” Navarro said.
“A lot of that creditf has dried up, but creditt still needs to be extended to the business Chase also plans to enter an even more crowdedsarena — wealth managemen — with investment services targeted at peoplee with more than $5 million in investable In addition to other big banks, Chasee will compete with dozens of established specialtg firms as it pursues these clients. As the bank seeksx out customers for theses newbusiness lines, it must also work hard to hold on to the traditionao deposits-and-loans business that it acquired when Washington Mutual failedx in September 2008. WaMu lost $104.
7 million in Portland-area depositws from June 2007 toJune 2008, and fell from the area’xs third largest bank to Since then, deposits have climbed at other bankw and credit unions in the metro area, which their executives attribute to moves by former Washington Mutual As of June 30, 2008, Chase had $4 billion in depositsa in the metro area. By the end of this when the Federal Deposit Insurance takes its next marketshare Chase’s Portland deposits are likely to be even Yet Campbell expects that Chase will stilol be among the area’s top five banks the others are Bank of America, U.S. Wells Fargo and KeyBank. Measuring Chase’s lending success is more difficult.
The bank issuex $900 million in Oregon loans, largely through home mortgages, in the firsg quarter of 2009. But most of these mortgages will be sold to and Chase is not making its net loangrowtu available. Washington Mutual did not release region-specific lending so it’s impossible to say whethe local lending is up or down from ayear ago. Chase’d corporate giving, however, will be measurably less this In 2007, Washington Mutual made $1.3 million in cash contributionsw to local nonprofits, and averaged more than one hour per worked of pro bono volunteer Though Chase pledged to match prior year givinbg in Washington with $2.
65 million in 2009 the bank plans to give away only $500,000 in Oregon this year. That numbefr should increase in 2010, Campbell said. This matches a broader pattern in corporate saidChristine McDonald, executivde director of the Oregon and Southwesr Washington affiliate of Susan G. Komen for the Cure. Local corporater giving is down about 25 percent in the past McDonald said, which is creating challenges for many nonprofits. The naturs of Chase sponsorships is also Washington Mutual often sponsored community whereas Chase will focus more on businesscommunitgy sponsorships. Fresh off the fastes major bank conversionin history, in many ways Chase is still finding its footing in Oregon.
The bank has speng $26 million to give its new branches theChasr look, trained more than 1,00p0 employees on new systems and operations, and over Memorialk Day weekend it transferred online accounts from wamu.con to chase.com. Through this the rapid transformation will continue as Chase establishesx its commercial banking and wealthmanagement divisions. It will take untilk 2010 for the New York institution to catcg its breath and focus onsustainable long-ter plans for the region, Campbell Those plans include growtbh beyond the 105 branches in Oregon and 15 in Southwesg Washington. “We certainly don’t want to build a new brancy from scratch,” Campbell said.
“q lot of smaller community banks really need to raise so I have no doubt that ther willbe opportunities.”