As part of U.S. Bancorp’s push on the West Coast, the bank’s brokerage division, Piper Jaffray, has opened offices in Newport Beach and San Diego.
The brokerage firm has plans for eight more offices in Southern California, with at least one being another in Orange County. The new Newport Beach office is in temporary quarters in MacArthur Court while a permanent Newport Center office is undergoing improvements.
“Southern California is the main focus for our current expansion. With U.S. Bank coming (to California), they wanted Piper to come in parallel,” said Bob Wolter, the California regional director for the brokerage.
U.S. Bancorp has acquired four banks in Southern California in the past 12 months,including Newport Beach-based Western Bancorp and three San Diego-based banks. It is itself set to be acquired by Firstar Corp.
U.S. Bancorp bought Piper Jaffray in 1998 after the Financial Services Modernization Act allowed banks to broaden their offerings into areas such as brokerage services and insurance.
The Newport Beach office is being built out for 21 brokers and 10 staff.
“Right now we are in temporary space of 5,000 square feet, and building out a permanent location of 8,000 square feet in Fashion Island,” Wolter said. Wolter expects to make the move to the permanent office at 620 Newport Center Drive in January.
The Newport Beach office is operating with four brokers, all former E*Offering brokers who did not want to make the move to the Bay Area last year when that brokerage relocated.
“They were corporate executive service representatives who wanted to stay in the area,” Wolter said. E*Offering’s departure gave other brokers and investment banks a deeper labor pool, since many of the firm’s employees wanted to stay in Orange County.
“Looking for brokers is always competitive,” Wolter said.
Though some venture capital and equity firms claim there is a need for more investment banking and private equity in Orange County and the rest of Southern California, Russ Smith, the managing director of Piper Jaffray’s San Diego office, said the brokerage has no plans to bring any investment bankers to either new office.
“I would love to see (investment) bankers here in Southern California. Our bankers in Northern California spend a lot of time down here,” Smith said. n
