Pittsburgh-based PNC Bank Corp. has shuffled executives and business lines as it embarks on an expansion of its brokerage and retail banking side, the company said Thursday.
PNC wants to hire 400 brokers to add to the 200 already on staff in its retail investment subsidiary, PNC Securities Corp. The company also plans to expand its credit card business and enter the consumer finance business.
To help meet those goals, Bruce E. Robbins, president and chief executive of PNC Bank, has been promoted to executive vice president of corporate banking at the parent company.
Taking Over 3 Areas
Mr. Robbins was already in charge of corporate banking. But with this promotion, he will take over PNCs corporate finance, public finance, and investment banking businesses.
Those lines of business were formerly directed by Robert Drysdale, president and chief executive of the securities subsidiary.
PNC spokesman Jonathan Williams said Mr. Drysdale will concentrate on expanding the bank's brokerage business. "It takes a lot of management on its own," he said.
Mr. Robbins' role at the Pittsburgh branch of the lead subsidiary bank will be taken by Edward Randall Jr., currently senior executive vice president there.
PNC has also hired Gary Fiedler, naming him executive vice president of PNC's $8 billion consumer lending business. Mr. Fiedler is known for turning around another Pittsburgh bank company, fledgling Equimark Corp., and then selling it more than a year ago to Integra Financial Corp.
Analysts reacted positively to the bank's reorganization. "It would seem to be a streamlining effort to bring related types of businesses under one head," said Frank Barkocy, an analyst at Advest Group.
In unrelated news, PNC also reported that the Office of the Comptroller of the Currency has approved its $330 million acquisition of First Eastern Corp., a $2 billion-asset bank based in Wilkes-Barre, Pa. The purchase had been announced a year ago.
Must Divest 3 Branches
The OCC granted approval on the condition that PNC divest three branches in communities where the regulator is concerned "about the effect of the merger on competition," PNC reported.
PNC also said it has reached a definitive agreement with Salem, NJ.-based First Fidelity Bank to acquire two branches in Monroe County, N.J. PNC did not disclose the cost of the deal.
