I am an enemy of most major mergers and the pursuit of bigness for bigness’ sake. I apparently have a staunch ally in Wells Fargo CEO Dick Kovacevich. I love this quote: “I don’t believe in economies of scale. You don’t get better by being bigger. You get worse.” Pretty unequivocal, eh?
Not so incidentally, Wells’ financial performance easily outpaces bigger, more acquisitive peers such as Citigroup, Bank of America, Wachovia, and J.P. Morgan Chase. A key pillar of Wells’ relative success: cross-selling beyond lip service; Kovacevich’s troops simply get far more bang-per-customer.
(Hey, it’s another great find from Forbes of August 16, devoured on my endless flight from O’Hare to Narita/Tokyo.)