John Donnelly quoted in Crain’s Detroit Business – “U.S. Bancorp to open loan office here”

National rankings for other banks with a strong Southeast Michigan presence were: No. 1, Bank of America, $184.5 billion; No. 4, Chase, $132.5 billion; No. 5, PNC, $53.9 billion; No. 7, Ally, $42.5 billion; No. 9, Fifth Third, $27.7 billion; No. 10, Comerica, $25.1 billion.

U.S. Bank, the fifth-largest bank in the U.S. and the largest of the so-called superregional banks that don’t have a national footprint — BOA, Wells Fargo, Citigroup and Chase are No. 1-4, respectively — has had a small presence in Michigan until now.

It has a small home mortgage office in Southfield and corporate trust offices in downtown Detroit, Lansing and Grand Rapids. It employs about 60 in the state. According to Nicole Garrison-Spregner, vice president of corporate public relations, the bank has no plans to open retail banking branches in Michigan.

Nationally, U.S. Bank has nearly 3,100 offices in 25 states and $352 billion in assets. By contrast, as of June 30, 2010, Flagstar Inc., the largest bank headquartered in Michigan, had $13.9 billion in assets. The oldest bank in Michigan, Comerica, which is headquartered in Texas, had $62.7 billion in assets.

For the third quarter that ended Sept. 30, U.S. Bancorp reported record net income of $1.5 billion and new and renewed commercial lending of $35.7 billion.

U.S. Bank has no bank branches in the state and until recently had no commercial loan operations here. It has done a limited amount of commercial lending here, some of it when it was asked to join syndicated deals others were putting together.

“We’ve been serving the Michigan market, mostly from Milwaukee and Chicago,” said Bertha. “But it’s always better to have people on the ground, people with good skills who know the area.”

He said that as the Michigan economy and the state’s auto industry recovered, U.S. Bank decided it wanted a much bigger presence here. Concurrently, Hilmer came to the bank’s attention last summer.

John Donnelly, of managing director of the Grosse Pointe investment banking firm of DPP & Partners, which has its main focus on the banking industry, said U.S. Bank’s leap into commercial lending here is big news.

“Look, U.S. Bank is the gold standard. They’re considered the best bank in the U.S. and among the most respected banks in the world. You have to take this seriously. They didn’t do this just to dabble,” he said. “And they’ve hired a top-notch person to do it.”

Hilmer had been a vice president of investment banking for Comerica before joining W.Y. Campbell in 1995. He ran its highly profitable public finance group.

“Hilmer is a problem-solver and one of the smartest commercial lenders I’ve ever come across. You put him on a deal, and he’ll get it done,” said Cliff Roesler, managing director of Birmingham-based financial advisory firm Angle Advisors LLC.

Roesler and Kevin Marsh formed Angle when W.Y. Campbell disbanded in 2010 after negotiations for employees to buy the company back from its parent company, Comerica, hit a dead end.

Others left to form a second investment banking firm, Birmingham-based Quarton Partners LLC, while Hilmer remained to help Comerica wind down affairs at W.Y. Campbell and attend to deals in the pipeline.

“In the last 15 years, U.S. Bank has had the top-rated management team in banking. That they reached out to Jim says a lot about his capabilities,” said Bill Campbell, who co-founded W.Y. Campbell with William McKinley in 1988 and continued to help run it after it was sold to Comerica in 1995.

“Jim was an exceptionally valuable employee at W.Y. Campbell. He made good money for us year in and year out,” said Campbell.

Hilmer was credited as sole manager on more than 300 underwritings in 15 years at W.Y. Campbell.

Hilmer is temporarily working out of U.S. Bank’s Southfield loan office while he looks for a permanent location for commercial lending. He said he already has several loan deals in the pipeline, well ahead of schedule.

“I didn’t bring a book of business, but I brought a book of contacts, and I’ve been working them hard and they are paying off,” said Hilmer. “There’s a lot of pent-up demand that needs to be met in the next couple of years, and we want to help meet it.”

Hilmer said he will hire experienced loan officers as he builds a pipeline of deals.

Mike Semanco, president and CEO of Rochester-based Hennessey Capital LLC, an asset-based lender, said U.S. Bank’s presence here makes sense and will help Michigan businesses.

“We’re leading the country out of the recession, and if you’re a big bank, you want to have an operation at the center of the recovery,” he said.

U.S. Bank has a focus on asset-based lending, too, but Semanco said that while his firm and U.S. Bank share a niche, they won’t be fighting for customers.

“They’ll be doing larger deals than we do,” he said. “We won’t be competing with them, and they won’t be taking deals away from us.”

Michael Ritchie, Comerica’s executive vice president of middle-market lending in Michigan who will replace Tom Ogden as Michigan market president in July, said U.S. Bank’s expanded presence here is further proof of how far the state has come since the bottom of the recession.

“It’s another sign of the revival Michigan is going through. We’ve become much more competitive relative to the rest of the country,” he said.

Ritchie said U.S. Bank’s presence is also good news for state companies. “There are a lot of capital intensive companies here that need bank financing,” he said.

But while he welcomes more capital to the state, Ritchie made it clear Comerica has no intention of giving up market share without a fight.

“I’m glad some of these other banks are starting to find us. But we’ve always been here, through tough times and good times,” he said. “Competition is the American way. I’m OK with it. We have a huge presence here. We have 150 people dedicated to middle-market lending. We’re good at it, and we’re very proud of the team we have.”