Wachovia
| Wachovia
|
|
|---|---|
 |
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| legal form | Corporation |
| ISIN | US9299031024 |
| founding | 1879 in Winston (now Winston-Salem ) |
| resolution | 2008 |
| Reason for dissolution | takeover |
| Seat | Charlotte , North Carolina |
| Number of employees | 120,000 (March 31, 2008) |
| Branch | Credit institution |
The Wachovia Corporation [ wʌˈkoʊvɪə ], based in Charlotte , North Carolina , was one of the largest banking chains in the United States . It was founded in Winston (now Winston-Salem ), North Carolina in 1879 . The company most recently had around 120,000 employees and $ 808.9 billion in fixed assets.
history
Wachovia National Bank merged with Wachovia Loan and Trust (founded in 1893) in 1911, and the new company has since been called Wachovia Corporation.
In 1986 Wachovia bought the First National Bank of Atlanta , and several smaller banks and financial service providers in the years that followed.
In 2001, the Wachovia Corporation surprisingly merged with the First Union Corporation . Although First Union was the acquiring company, the name Wachovia was adapted and the First Union brand was completely replaced by 2003. Further acquisitions in the years that followed made Wachovia Corporation the fourth largest bank in the United States.
In May 2007, Wachovia took over the large American stock brokerage firm A. G. Edwards for $ 6.8 billion (EUR 5.0 billion).
Criminal entanglements
American investigator Robert Mazur revealed that the Wachovia Bank was heavily involved in international money laundering . For example, $ 400 billion in illicit money from Mexico are said to have been smuggled through the bank's accounts in order to conceal the true origin of the money.
2007/2008 financial crisis
On April 14, 2008 it was announced that Wachovia had made a quarterly loss of approximately two billion dollars from 2007 in the wake of the financial crisis . CEO Ken Thompson justified this with "unprecedented economic conditions". As a result of the heavy losses, Ken Thompson was released on June 2, 2008 and replaced by Lanty Smith. Wachovia was particularly hard hit by the US real estate crisis when it bought the mortgage bank Golden West Financial Corp. in 2006 . It also took over a $ 122 billion portfolio of loans that had to be devalued in 2008.
On September 18, 2008, the press reported that the troubled investment bank Morgan Stanley was in talks with Wachovia about a merger. Two weekends later, Wachovia fell victim to the US housing crisis herself. On September 29, 2008, it was announced that Wachovia's banking business would be sold.
According to a report in the Wall Street Journal on Monday October 6, 2008, the company was to be broken up between the two potential buyers Citigroup and Wells Fargo . At the end of 2008, Wachovia was completely taken over by Wells Fargo.
Web links
Individual evidence
- ^ The Guardian: How a big US bank laundered billions from Mexico's murderous drug gangs , accessed April 4, 2011.
- ^ David Mildenberg and Hugh Son: Wachovia's Ouster of Thompson Hints Losses, Takeover . Bloomberg.com, June 2, 2008 (accessed September 29, 2008)
- ↑ Morgan Stanley examines emergency fusion with Wachovia . Spiegel Online , September 18, 2008 (accessed September 29, 2008)
- ↑ Citigroup takes over Wachovia . Spiegel Online , September 29, 2008 (accessed September 29, 2008)
- ↑ Financial Times Deutschland: Wachovia is to be smashed ( Memento of October 7, 2008 in the Internet Archive ). October 7, 2008
- ↑ http://www.bluewin.ch/de/index.php/24,112552/Merrill_Lynch_und_Wachovia_verlieren_ihre_Eigenstaendigkeit/?hbx.hc1=de_news ( page no longer available , search in web archives ) Info: The link was automatically marked as defective. Please check the link according to the instructions and then remove this notice.
