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National Bank of Canada acquires Canadian Western Bank in $5B deal

"We're going to work hard on making sure that they feel like they're actually getting a better deal out of this. So, we want local clients to feel like their technology is going to be enhanced, that the level of service is at the same level, if not better, and that decisions are as fast"

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National Bank of Canada completed its $5-billion acquisition of the Edmonton-based Canadian Western Bank on Monday, bringing with it a name change and a move from its home at the Canadian Western Bank Place on Jasper Avenue to Manulife Place.

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“Our goal is if we can put our technology, our balance sheet, our cost of capital, combined with what CWB has built here, it’s like putting CWB on steroids,” said National Bank CEO Laurent Ferreira.

The deal was finalized on Monday, but Ferreira said that National Bank had been eyeing CWB for a few years. He said the environment for CWB had gotten “more and more difficult” as is the case for similar smaller regional banks, making the acquisition timely for the partnership. Ferreira discussed how the two banks navigated the cultural differences between the Montreal-based National Bank and the Alberta-based CWB in order to facilitate their coming together.

“We talked about cultural differences and how would that work, and you know, French and English, how would that work? And we came to the conclusion that, wow, we have a lot of things in common and that’s what we want to leverage,” said Ferreira.

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Canadian Western Bank was founded in 1984 by Dr. Charles Allard and Eugene Pechet, who wanted to create a bank with strong customer service, run by “common sense people” that ensured better lending to Western Canadian citizens at a time when central-Canadian banks were hesitant to lend out west.

Management practices would be nimble, non-bureaucratic, and decision-making would be local,” says the bank’s history page on its website of its operational method.

Ferreira said those founding principles are not too dissimilar from National Bank’s own beginnings.

“(National Bank) was created for entrepreneurs. It was entrepreneurs who were having a hard time getting funding for their businesses, for their plan.”

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National Bank was founded in 1859 by Quebec City business owners, looking to serve their peers of other French-speaking business owners.

cwb building
Canadian Western Bank Place in downtown Edmonton on Jan. 22, 2021. Edmonton’s downtown office vacancy rate is at an all time high due mainly to the COVID-19 pandemic. Photo by Larry Wong / Postmedia Larry Won /POSTMEDIA NETWORK

“CWB, and the Bank of Alberta before CWB, same story. So, we understand that, and we know we have to be a bit different versus the larger banks in Canada to be able to win out there and gain market share,” said Ferreira.

‘Very large footprint’

He said those founding principles won’t change, emphasizing local leadership, equipped with the ability to make decisions about clients in the area, but that larger files may incorporate input from the board.

“Obviously, if we start doing much bigger files, we have a very large footprint in the oil and gas sector based out of Calgary. A lot of those files are very big. Some of the files have to go back to our board because they’re very large,” he said.

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“We’ll adapt, depending on the growth and what we’re doing.”

For clients loyal to CWB’s legacy who may be concerned about what they’re getting out of the acquisition, Ferreira hopes to make them even happier than they might be now.

“We’re going to work hard on making sure that they feel like they’re actually getting a better deal out of this. So, we want local clients to feel like their technology is going to be enhanced, that the level of service is at the same level, if not better, and that decisions are as fast.”

Along with the acquisition will come a name change that Ferreira said will happen over time.

“We want to recognize the history of CWB but in an acquisition like this we’re also looking for brand simplicity, and so we will be transitioning, over time, to National Bank of Canada as one brand for the whole bank.”

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Ferreira acknowledged that with any acquisition there are likely to be redundancies within some areas of both businesses, and as such some employees might find themselves out of work in the change over, but he highlighted instead the chance for growth for workers with access to more opportunities.

National Bank recently opened its first call centre outside of Quebec in Edmonton with roughly 10 workers, but Ferreira said more growth is on the way.

“I’ve been with the bank for 27 years, and I remember visiting cities across Canada, including Edmonton, and coming here for a meeting with our National Bank employees. And you would end up in a conference room with about 10 tables, but we had 1,000 people this morning at our meeting, and so we want to grow from that,” said Ferreira.

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Strong presence in Alberta

Ferreira said the bank intends to be present in the business community, and present in the broader community, including sponsorship and donations, as the dust continues to settle from the acquisition.

“Alberta is going to be a very important province for us as we keep growing and we’re going to have a very strong presence here in Edmonton, as well as in Calgary,” he said.

“The National Bank is not a visible bank out west, but it will become a visible bank.”

zdelaney@postmedia.com

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