B of A Vice Chairman Quits; Wells Fargo Alumnus Slated
In a surprise to the financial community, Robert W. Frick resigned Monday as vice chairman of Bank of America. He was replaced with yet another alumnus of Wells Fargo Bank.
Frick, 50, was chief of the world banking division at B of A and was considered a possible successor to the bank’s chairman, A. W. Clausen. But his division has been reduced over the past two years as the bank struggled to recover from record losses and began to focus on its consumer business in California.
Frick, whose resignation was submitted to the bank’s board at its regular meeting Monday morning, said he was quitting the $435,000-a-year post to make a “life style change.” He spent 23 years at B of A. The resignation is effective June 1.
His successor as vice chairman and head of world banking will be Lewis W. Coleman, who has been an executive vice president at B of A since being hired away from Wells Fargo in 1986. He was in charge of supervising big commercial and international loans when he left Wells Fargo.
Head the List
Coleman’s elevation means that all four of the banking giant’s vice chairmen under Clausen are veterans of Wells Fargo, which is headquartered nearby in San Francisco’s financial district. The others are Frank N. Newman, chief financial officer; Richard M. Rosenberg, head of California banking, and Glenhall E. Taylor Jr., head of credit policy.
The rise of the Wells Fargo alumni marks a dramatic change in an institution that once prided itself on developing its own executives, and insiders speculated that Rosenberg and Newman are now the leading candidates to replace Clausen, who is 65.
Clausen, who returned to the bank from retirement in 1986, has not said when he plans to retire again, and the bank never has commented officially on a successor.
The ranks of the vice chairmen also demonstrate the transformation of Bank of America from a sprawling multinational bank with a primarily international outlook to one that is leaner and focused more closely on its consumer business in California and, through its Seafirst banking unit, Washington.
“The Wells guys came from a background which certainly spoke of considerable efficiency in terms of bank operations and of a concentration on consumer business,” said Dan B. Williams, an analyst with the San Francisco investment firm of Sutro & Co.
A longtime executive at B of A compared the hiring of former Wells Fargo executives to Bill Walsh’s rebuilding of the San Francisco 49ers.
“These people have fit very well into the Bank of America,” said the executive. “To the outside world, it may look like a takeover. To the insiders here, we’re really glad to have these guys on the team.”
In his parting statement, Frick said he had a longstanding promise to himself to make a life style change when he reached 50. He did not say what he plans to do.
He said he was confident that the bank was on the road to recovery, a phrase that has been on the lips of many B of A executives after three quarters in the black following three years of record losses.
Clausen praised Frick’s contributions to the bank “through good times and bad.”
Frick joined B of A in 1963, left for a brief period in the 1970s to head a computer company, and returned in 1976. Since then, he had been chief financial officer and its principal commercial banker along with heading the world banking operation.
