Call it the CFO shuffle of 2007.
The announcements Monday by Citigroup Inc. and Bank of Hawaii Inc. of the departures of their chief financial officers came after Friday's news from U.S. Bancorp that
Richard Keene, Bank of Hawaii's CFO, is to leave the Honolulu company this quarter, it said.
Allan Landon, the chairman and chief executive officer of $11 billion-asset Bank of Hawaii, said Monday that Mr. Keene "did a great job for us" and that he is leaving to take a job at a Hawaiian organization he declined to name. It is unclear what role Mr. Keene would then play.
"Being CFO of a publicly traded company has a lot of challenges involved in it. It is a tough job," Mr. Landon said.
Mr. Keene's departure came as Citigroup, the New York banking giant, said
The $219 billion-asset U.S. Bancorp in Minneapolis said late Friday that Mr. Moffett, 54, intends to retire at the end of February and will be succeeded by Andrew Cecere, 46, a vice chairman who has headed U.S. Bancorp's wealth management group since 2001.
All three companies reported fourth-quarter and full-year earnings recently.
Mr. Landon and others said the pressure of being CFO goes beyond managing the company's finances.
"The demands just continue to increase from a compliance standpoint, a regulatory standpoint, and market expectations, and it takes a toll. It's hard, constant work, and so I can understand if somebody wanted to take a breather," he said.
CFO "is not only a challenging job but a very tension-filled job," Mike McMahon, an analyst at Sandler O'Neill & Partners LP who covers Bank of Hawaii, said Monday.
Other recent CFO departures include that of Alvaro G. de Molina, who resigned from Bank of America Corp. in early December after 15 months in the job. He had succeeded Marc Oken, who retired from the $1.5 trillion-asset Charlotte company after 17 months as CFO.
On Monday some analysts speculated that Mr. de Molina could be named to fill the vacancy at Citigroup.
However, Charles O. Prince said Monday that Mr. de Molina appears to have made it clear that he is not looking for another CFO job but rather is seeking a CEO position somewhere.
Mr. Keene had been CFO at Bank of Hawaii since 2004, and Mr. Landon said he also helped to prepare two three-year strategic plans, as controller before 2004 and later as CFO. He also prepared the company's latest plan, which was unveiled Monday along with fourth-quarter and full-year earnings.
Unlike the previous two plans, the "2007+ Plan" does not specify a time frame, Mr. Landon said. Designed for the current interest rate environment, it seeks moderate revenue growth and improvements in the efficiency ratio. It assumes the company will not expand beyond existing markets.
"We think this plan works pretty well in this current environment, but we want to preserve a little flexibility to adjust it if the economy changes," Mr. Landon said.
Bank of Hawaii reported fourth-quarter net income of $50.9 million, up 14% from a year earlier, and earnings per share of $1.01, up 15 cents from a year earlier and 6 cents ahead of the average of analysts' estimates. A lower tax rate in the quarter accounted for the stronger than expected results, analysts said. For the year, net income fell 0.7%, and earnings per share of $3.52 rose 11 cents.
Fourth-quarter revenue de-clined 0.3% from a year earlier. Net interest income in the quarter was $100.4 million, down 3% from a year earlier, and noninterest income of $53.5 million was up 5%.
