Lloyds Bank California was a wholly owned subsidiary of
Lloyds Bank
Lloyds Bank plc is a British retail banking, retail and commercial bank with branches across England and Wales. It has traditionally been considered one of the "Big Four (banking), Big Four" clearing house (finance), clearing banks. Lloyds B ...
Plc in the United Kingdom from 1974 to 1986. Throughout its existence, the U.S.
retail bank
Retail banking, also known as consumer banking or personal banking, is the provision of services by a bank to the general public, rather than to companies, corporations or other banks, which are often described as wholesale banking. Banking servi ...
ing operation functioned as an autonomous unit of the Lloyds Bank Group, alongside
Lloyds Bank International
Lloyds Bank International is a wholly owned subsidiary of Lloyds Bank Corporate Markets in the United Kingdom, which is in turn part of Lloyds Banking Group, one of the largest banking groups in Europe.
Lloyds Bank's overseas expansion began in ...
and the
National Bank of New Zealand
The National Bank of New Zealand Limited (NBNZ), often referred to as The National Bank, was one of New Zealand's largest banks. Throughout much of its history, the National Bank provided commercial banking services to mainly major industrial and ...
.
Lloyds Bank California was a commercial bank with a state charter, headquartered in
Los Angeles
Los Angeles ( ; es, Los Ángeles, link=no , ), often referred to by its initials L.A., is the largest city in the state of California and the second most populous city in the United States after New York City, as well as one of the world' ...
, supervised by the
Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation
The Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation (FDIC) is one of two agencies that supply deposit insurance to depositors in American depository institutions, the other being the National Credit Union Administration, which regulates and insures cred ...
. Formerly the First Western Bank and Trust Company, which traced its origins to 1808, it was sold to Golden State Sanwa Bank in 1986.
History
1970s
In 1974, London-based Lloyds Bank Limited acquired the 94-branch First Western Bank and Trust Company from World Airways, Inc. of Oakland, California, at a price of US$115 million. The
Delaware-registered holding company, Lloyds First Western Corporation, was formed to facilitate the purchase. In accordance with the Group's policy of non-participation in consortium banks, Lloyds Bank California relinquished its holding in London Interstate Bank in 1975.
First Western, a state-chartered bank which traced its history back to 1808, had been owned by World Airways since 1968, when its assets were approximately $900 million. At the time of the acquisition by Lloyds Bank, it ranked eighth-largest among Californian banks with assets of $1.3 billion.
Further expansion occurred in 1976, when Lloyds Bank California acquired First State Bank of Northern California, which had been formed in San Leandro in 1962, adding another four branches which were rapidly integrated to the network.
During the course of 1977, Lloyds Bank California developed two programs to expand its field of activities and add to the services offered to customers. It entered into the equipment leasing business to take advantage of the rapidly expanding volume of industrial equipment leasing which had occurred within the U.S. and also completed preparations to establish a mortgage banking department, to engage in the growing residential mortgage market by making long-term mortgage loans to be sold to institutional investors and serviced by the Bank.
The Bank opened its 100th branch office in 1979 and commenced work on a new computer and operations center, designed to accommodate 900 staff, enabling the centralization of many of its support functions. In order to meet the need of the local market, drive-up cashier tills were long incorporated into the design of many of its offices. This service was available at more than 50 per cent of branches, many of which had multiple lanes, with up to 40 per cent of the business at a branch conducted at a drive-up window. In 1979, Lloyds Bank California also installed its first online cash dispensers at branches in the San Francisco area.
1980s
Plans to enter the growing markets of San Jose in northern California and Newport Beach in the south finally materialized in 1980. In addition, several offices were re-located, including the northern California administrative headquarters in San Francisco. By the end of the year, a new 205,000-square-foot operations center in the center of the Los Angeles financial district was fully functional, reflecting the Bank's growing importance. The operations center began automation, converting all systems to the
IBM computer in 1981, and, by early 1982, the Bank's
ATM network was doubled in capacity.
Business was boosted by the Lloyds Privilege Banking program in 1983, a package of revolving lines of credit, investment facilities and advice, pension and retirement savings plans, financial planning and trust services and real estate and home loans. Changes in banking regulations and advances in technology gave customers access to a whole range of financial products from a single source. Lloyds Bank California joined with 11 other financial companies in 1984, as founder members of the Star System ATM network and computerization made possible a new personalized financial planning package for wealthy people.
In 1985, Lloyds Bank announced its intention to dispose of the share capital of Lloyds Bank California, which had produced below-average returns for the Group, deciding to concentrate its resources in the U.S. on its successful and profitable corporate business, based in New York. Lloyds Bank California's 88 branches and $3 billion in assets was divested to Japanese-owned Golden State Sanwa Bank for a $263 million cash consideration in 1986, to form Sanwa Bank California.
Sanwa Bank
was a major Japanese bank headquartered in Osaka, which operated from 1933 to 2002. It merged with Tokai Bank to form UFJ Bank (now part of MUFG Bank). In the 1990s, it was the most profitable bank in the world, and second-largest in terms of asse ...
KK had established an agency in California in 1953 and a subsidiary in 1972. It acquired Charter Bank in 1973 and merged with Golden State Bank, one of the oldest financial institutions in California, in 1978.
[Tschoegl, Adrian E]
Foreign Banks in the United States Since World War II: A Useful Fringe
(p. 23) The Wharton Financial Institutions Centre, University of Pennsylvania (00-42), November 2000 In 2001, Sanwa Bank California acquired Tokai Bank of California becoming United California Bank, before being merged into and subsequently operated as part of
Bank of the West
Bank of the West is an American financial institution headquartered in San Francisco, California, United States. It is a subsidiary of the French international banking group BNP Paribas and has more than 600 branches and offices in the Midwes ...
from 2002.
See also
*
Bank of London and South America
The Bank of London and South America Limited (BOLSA; es, Banco de Londres y América del Sur, also known simply as ''Banco de Londres'') was a British bank, which operated in South America between 1923 and 1971.
Origins
The bank's predecessor w ...
*
Bank of London and Montreal
The Bank of London and Montreal Limited was a joint venture between Bank of London and South America (BOLSA), a subsidiary of Lloyds Bank, and Bank of Montreal. It was established in 1958 and headquartered in Nassau, Bahamas.
History
*1958 Bank o ...
*
Lloyds Bank Canada
Lloyds Bank Canada was a wholly owned Canadian subsidiary of Lloyds Bank Plc of the United Kingdom from 1986 to 1990. Its headquarters were in Toronto, and it had 53 branches throughout Canada. It functioned as a member of the Lloyds Bank Group, wh ...
*
Sabadell Solbank
Sabadell Solbank was a Spanish bank owned by Banco de Sabadell, which focussed on retail banking for Europeans living in the coastal areas of southern Spain. In 2014, it was fully integrated into the parent company.
History Banco NatWest España ...
References
{{Lloyds Banking Group
Lloyds Banking Group
Banks established in 1974
Banks disestablished in 1986
Defunct banks of the United States