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Wells Fargo Names John Sotoodeh Head of Los Angeles Community Banking

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^{Published in Business and Finance on Tuesday, February 3rd 2009 at 10:35 GMT, Last Modified on 2009-02-03 10:35:55 by Market Wire}  

LOS ANGELES--([ BUSINESS WIRE ])--Wells Fargo & Company (NYSE:WFC) has named John Sotoodeh, a 19-year veteran of the company, regional president for Los Angeles Metro Community Banking. He will be responsible for 5,200 team members and 265 banking stores, with $29 billion in deposits, in Los Angeles, Ventura, Santa Barbara and western San Bernardino counties. Sotoodeh succeeds Shelley Freeman, who was recently named regional president of the company's Community Bank in Florida.

The company also announced that Lisa Stevens was named regional president of California Community Banking, which will continue to be headquartered in Los Angeles. She succeeds Laura Schulte, who is heading the company's Community Banking operations on the East Coast, based in Charlotte, N.C. Stevens, who was most recently head of Community Banking for the San Francisco Bay and Oregon markets, now oversees 1,151 banking stores with $149 billion in deposits throughout California.

"The Los Angeles market is one of the largest, fastest growing and most diverse markets for Wells Fargo," said Stevens. "We're delighted to have John, who has exceptional banking and management skills and a deep commitment to community involvement, lead our very successful Los Angeles team. Because Los Angeles is such an important market, the company decided that our community banking operations for the entire state will continue to be headquartered here. I look forward to joining John in Los Angeles and becoming active in the community."

Sotoodeh was most recently regional president for Community Banking in the Southern California region, which includes 160 banking stores across San Diego, Imperial, Riverside and San Bernardino counties. Before that, he was Community Bank regional president of the Peninsula area in the San Francisco Bay market. He joined Wells Fargo in 1990 as a teller.

Sotoodeh, who earned his bachelor's degree in finance from San Jose State University, is active in the community and serves on the board of directors of the San Diego Food Bank. He also is a cabinet member of Wells Fargo's Community Support and United Way Campaign.

Stevens also is active in the community and serves on numerous boards, including the San Francisco Opera, the San Francisco Unified School District Business Advisory Council, California State University's Foundation Board of Governors, the Santa Clara University Board of Fellows and the board of directors for SF Connect. She has a bachelor's degree in political science from Santa Clara University.

Wells Fargo & Company is a diversified financial services company with $1.3 trillion in assets, providing banking, insurance, investments, mortgage and consumer finance through more than 11,000 stores, over 12,000 ATMs and the internet ([ wellsfargo.com ]) across North America and internationally. Wells Fargo Bank, N.A. has the highest credit rating currently given to U.S. banks by Moody's Investors Service, "Aa1," and Standard & Poor's Ratings Services, "AA+."