CHICAGO — Wells Fargo & Co. has hired veteran Chicago-based public finance banker Victor Chang to build the firm’s local business — a plan that includes the hiring of a few additional bankers.
Chang, a senior vice president, recently left Hutchinson, Shockey, Erley & Co. after two years to join Wells Fargo Institutional Brokerage Services LLC. He previously had worked for 10 years at LaSalle Financial Services Inc., which was recently absorbed by Bank of America Corp. He also worked at the former First Chicago Capital Markets Inc. for 16 years. Chang’s experience includes local and state government issuers and the real estate, community development, and higher education sectors.
For Chang, the move to Wells Fargo provides him with a chance to put together and lead a banking group. “It was a better opportunity for me,” Chang, 54, said. “They would like to get a business going here with four to six bankers to service the Chicago market along with their commercial bankers.”
Wells Fargo had an existing Chicago office out of which it conducted commercial banking business and private wealth management work. Three sales professionals and one trader here work on both corporate and municipal deals.
The firm’s push into the Chicago market includes a “concentrated effort” on the health care and environmental sectors, Chang said. The banking staff will also pursue Chicago deals and other area issuers and have responsibility for seeking business in Indiana, Ohio, and Pennsylvania.
The firm’s move to carve out more business in Illinois and other states is part of a larger, ambitious goal to double its public finance revenue by 2010.
“Chicago is a key growth market for Wells Fargo as a company and for our public finance group in particular,” said William Gabler, head of Wells Fargo’s public finance group. “We hope to hire more investment bankers here in the near future to better serve our Midwest customers.”
The growth mandate came from Gabler’s bosses in 2006. Though officials have said they had a record year in 2006, public finance is not segregated in their financial reports.
With growth in mind, the firm has been on a hiring spree, nearly doubling its staff since 2004. The firm’s public finance group currently employs 38 bankers and 21 analytical and support professionals located in 15 offices in the West, Midwest, and Southwest. The current Wells Fargo public finance group resulted from the merger of Wells Fargo Bank and Norwest Financial Service Inc. in 1998.
The firm so far this year ranked 31st in the Midwest among senior managers while it placed 40th in Illinois and 35th nationally, according to Thomson Financial.
