California First Appoints Chairman, Board Member

Tamotsu Yamaguchi has been elected chairman of California First Bank, replacing Toshio Nagamura, who resigned because of ill health.

Yamaguchi’s appointment is effective Monday, the day San Francisco-based Cal First completes its acquisition of Union Bank in Los Angeles. Yamaguchi will head the board of the combined bank.

Yamaguchi, 58, is senior managing director for the Americas for Bank of Tokyo, the parent organization of Cal First and the merged bank, which will be called Union Bank. He spent 35 years with the big Japanese bank in Tokyo, London and Sao Paulo, Brazil, before coming to the United States in 1986.

Nagamura, 62, a Los Angeles resident, had been a deputy president of Bank of Tokyo before becoming chairman of Cal First in 1984.

In another change, Tom Shiba, 48, a Cal First executive vice president, was elected to the bank board and will remain here to head the integration of Cal First and Union. He was elected to the board to replace Shiro Wakabayashi, who returned to Japan for Bank of Tokyo.

Shiba, who played a major role in an earlier Cal First acquisition, was an executive in the systems division of the parent bank in Tokyo before returning to California to supervise the merger earlier this year.