Bank of the West’s $16.3B Acquisition Nearly Final

BMO Financial Group has received all regulatory approvals to complete its $16.3 billion acquisition of San Francisco-based Bank of the West from BNP Paribas, and expects the transaction will close on February 1, 2023. In addition, BMO has announced that Bank of the West CEO Nandita Bakhshi and Director Claudia Fan Munce are expected to be appointed to the Board of Directors of the firm’s U.S. holding company, BMO Financial Corp., effective as of closing.

The deal, which has been in the works for over a year, will see the Bank of Montreal (BMO) welcome nearly 1.8 million commercial, retail, wealth management and business banking customers from Bank of the West, along with over 9,300 employees.

“We’ve been providing banking services to BMO customers for over 200 years and we look forward to working with communities across our expanded U.S. footprint to help drive meaningful change at the local level through a strong combination of financial and community-driven investment,” said David Casper, U.S. CEO of Chicago-based BMO Financial Group.