Wells Fargo-Wachovia merger completed

01 January 2009

Wachovia today said that its shareholders had approved the Wells Fargo merger at a special meeting. The merger was approved by approximately 76 per cent of the votes entitled to be cast by the holders of Wachovia's outstanding shares of common stock and Series M preferred stock, including a majority of the outstanding shares of Wachovia's common stock.

The merger has created a financial-services giant with $1.4 trillion in assets creating the fourth largest bank in US.

On 3 October 2008, San Francisco, California-based Wells Fargo had announced its definitive agreement to buy troubled Charlotte-based bank Wachovia for about $15.1 billion in a stock-for-stock transaction, approved unanimously by the boards of both companies (See: Citi fumes as Wells Fargo steals Wachovia) 

Infact, prior to receiving the offer from Wells Fargo, Wachovia had been negotiating with Citigroup to complete a transaction brokered by the Federal Deposit Insurance Corp., which included assistance from the government (See: Citi to acquire Wachovia assets in a US government-backed rescue) 

On 29 September, New-York-based Citi had agreed in principle to acquire the banking operations of Wachovia in a $2.1-billion deal. In the subsequent and prolonged legal takeover battle for Wachovia, Wells Fargo succeeded in winning the deal after Citibank decided to terminate its talks with Wells Fargo and walk out of the deal in early October (See: Citigroup abandons fight for Wachovia; will press lawsuit against Wells Fargo). Wells Fargo has merged the entire operations including investment banking and securities. 

Merger to be tougher than expected