HONOLULU - Pacific Century Financial Corp. hired executives Tuesday to be chief risk officer and director of asset recovery.
The appointments wrapped up months of searching for people to help the company clean up its credit-quality problems.
William Nelson, a 24-year veteran of Bank of America Corp., was named chief risk officer, succeeding Robert Paris, who is to retire Jan. 31 as chief credit officer.
Mr. Nelson is to manage all financial risk activities for the company and its flagship, Bank of Hawaii, with the exceptions of interest rates and liquidity. He was also named a vice chairman and a member of the seven-person managing committee. He reports to Michael E. O'Neill, chairman and chief executive of Pacific Century.
Mr. Nelson was a managing director at Bank of America's headquarters in Charlotte, N.C., and was most recently in charge of its credit products group for U.S. health-care companies.
Scott Miller, president of Heller Commercial Services, the former factoring unit of Heller Financial Inc. in Chicago, was named executive vice president and director of asset recovery. He reports to Mr. Nelson.
Before joining Heller, Mr. Miller spent five years at the former BankAmerica Corp. in Los Angeles.
"Resolving our credit-quality issues is my top priority for this coming year, and having professionals of this caliber joining our ranks is a huge step forward for us," Mr. O'Neill said in a statement.
