About East West Bancorp

East West Bancorp, Inc. operates as the bank holding company for East West Bank (Bank) that provides personal and commercial banking services to businesses and individuals. The company operates in over 120 locations in the U.S. and Asia. In the U.S. The company’s corporate headquarters and main administrative offices are located in California; its U.S. branches and offices are located in California, Texas, New York, Washington, Georgia, Massachusetts, Illinois, and Nevada. In Asia, the company has full-service branches in Hong Kong, Shanghai, Shantou and Shenzhen, and representative offices in Beijing, Chongqing, Guangzhou, Xiamen and Singapore. Strategy The company’s strategy focuses on seeking out and deepening client relationships that meet its risk/return parameters. This guides the company’s decision-making across every aspect of its operations: the products it develops, the expertise it cultivates, and the infrastructure it builds to help its customers conduct their businesses. The company constantly invests in technology to improve the customer user experience, strengthen critical business infrastructure, and streamline core processes, while properly managing operating expenses. The company has a commercial business operating license in China through its subsidiary, East West Bank (China) Limited, which makes it unique among U.S.-based regional banks. This license allows the company to open branches, make loans and collect deposits in the country. The company continues to develop its international banking presence with its network of overseas branches and representative offices. The latest expansion is the Singapore representative office, which opened in January 2023. In addition to facilitating traditional letters of credit and trade financing to businesses, these representative offices allow the company to assist existing clients and to develop new business relationships. Through its branches and offices, the company focuses on growing its cross-border client base between the U.S. and Asia, helping U.S.-based businesses expand in Asia, and helping companies based in Asia pursue business opportunities in the U.S. Banking Services The company is the largest independent bank in the U.S. focused on the financial service needs of individuals and businesses that operate both in the U.S. and Asia, and has a strong focus on the Asian American community. Through its network of various banking locations in the U.S. and Asia, the company provides a wide range of personal and commercial banking services to businesses and individuals. The company provides services to its customers in English and in over 10 other languages. In addition to offering traditional deposit products that include personal and business checking and savings accounts, money market, and time deposits, the company offers foreign exchange, treasury management and wealth management services. The company’s lending activities include commercial and residential real estate lending, construction finance, commercial business lending, working capital lines of credit, trade finance, letters of credit, affordable housing lending, asset-based lending, asset-backed finance, project finance, equipment financing and loan syndication. The company also provides financing services to clients in need of a financial bridge to facilitate their business transactions between the U.S. and Asia. Additionally, to support the business needs of its customers, the company offers hedging advisory and various derivative contracts, such as interest rate, energy commodity and foreign exchange contracts. The integration of digital with brick and mortar channels has been an area of investment for the company, for both commercial and consumer banking. The company’s strategic priorities include the use of technology to innovate and expand commercial payments, treasury management products and services, and consumer banking. The company has developed mobile and online banking platforms, which are continually enhanced to enrich its customer user experience, and which offer a full suite of banking services tailored to its customers’ unique needs. Segments The company operates through three segments: Consumer and Business Banking; Commercial Banking; and Other. The Consumer and Business Banking segment primarily provides financial products and services to consumer and commercial customers through the company’s domestic branch network. The Commercial Banking segment primarily generates commercial loans and deposits. The remaining centralized functions, including the corporate treasury activities of the company are aggregated and included in the Other segment. Loan Portfolio The company offers a broad range of financial products designed to meet the credit needs of its borrowers. The company’s loan portfolio segments include commercial loans, which consist of commercial and industrial (C&I), commercial and industrial (CRE), multifamily residential, and construction and land loans, as well as consumer loans, which consist of single-family residential, home equity lines of credit (HELOCs) and other consumer loans. Investment Portfolio As of December 31, 2022, the company’s investment portfolio included U.S. Treasury securities; U.S. government agency and U.S. government-sponsored enterprise debt securities; U.S. government agency and U.S. government-sponsored enterprise mortgage-backed securities; municipal securities; non-agency mortgage-backed securities; corporate debt securities; foreign government bonds; asset-backed securities; and Collateralized loan obligations (CLOs). Supervision and Regulation The company and the bank are subject to extensive and comprehensive regulations under U.S. federal and state laws. Regulation and supervision by the federal and state banking agencies are intended primarily for the protection of depositors, the Deposit Insurance Fund (DIF) administered by the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation (FDIC), consumers, and the banking system as a whole, and not for the protection of its investors. As a bank holding company, the company is subject to primary regulation, supervision, and examination by the Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve System (Federal Reserve) under the BHC Act. The bank is regulated, supervised, and examined by the Federal Reserve, the California Department of Financial Protection and Innovation (DFPI), and, with respect to consumer laws, the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (CFPB). As the insurer of the bank’s deposits, the FDIC has back-up examination authority of the bank as well. In addition, the bank is regulated by foreign regulatory agencies in international jurisdictions where the company has a presence, including China, Hong Kong and Singapore. The company also has a wholly-owned nonbank subsidiary, East West Markets, LLC (East West Markets), which is an California Department of Financial Protection and Innovation (SEC)-registered broker-dealer and a member of the Financial Industry Regulatory Authority, Inc. (FINRA). East West Markets is subject to regulatory requirements from several regulatory bodies, including the SEC, California Department of Financial Protection and Innovation (FINRA), and state securities regulators. The company is also subject to the disclosure and regulatory requirements under the Securities Act of 1933, as amended, and Section 21E of the Exchange Act, as amended, both as administered by the SEC. As a bank holding company and pursuant to its election of financial holding company status, the company is subject to regulation, supervision, and examination by the Federal Reserve under the BHC Act. The company’s election to be a financial holding company as permitted under the Gramm-Leach-Bliley Act of 1999 (GLBA) generally allows East West to engage in any activity that the Federal Reserve has determined to be financial in nature or incidental or complementary to activities that are financial in nature, or acquire and retain the shares of a company engaged in any such activity, without prior Federal Reserve approval. The bank is a California state-chartered bank and a member of the Federal Reserve System, and its deposits are insured by the FDIC. The bank’s operations in the U.S. are primarily regulated and supervised by the Federal Reserve and the California Department of Financial Protection and Innovation (DFPI), and its activities outside the U.S. are regulated and supervised by its U.S. regulators and the applicable regulatory authority in the host country in which each overseas office is located. Specific federal and state laws and regulations that are applicable to banks monitor, among other things, their regulatory capital levels, the scope of their business, their investments, their reserves against deposits, the timing of the availability of deposited funds, and the nature and amount of collateral for certain loans. The bank has a CRA rating of at least Satisfactory. The bank’s foreign subsidiary, East West Bank (China) Limited, is subject to applicable foreign laws and regulations, such as those implemented by the China Banking and Insurance Regulatory Commission (CBIRC). The bank’s Hong Kong branch is subject to applicable foreign laws and regulations, such as those implemented by the Hong Kong Monetary Authority (HKMA) and the Hong Kong Securities and Futures Commission (HKSFC). The Singapore representative office, which opened in January 2023, is subject to applicable foreign laws and regulations, such as those implemented by the Monetary Authority of Singapore (MAS). The bank is a member of the Federal Home Loan Bank (FHLB) of San Francisco. As an FHLB member, the bank is required to own a certain amount of capital stock in the FHLB. The FDIC insures the bank’s customer deposits through the DIF up to $250,000 for each depositor, per FDIC-insured bank, for each account ownership category. The DIF is funded mainly through quarterly insurance assessments on insured banks based on their assessment base. The bank’s DIF quarterly assessment is calculated by multiplying its assessment base by the applicable assessment rate. The company regularly evaluates and continues to enhance its systems and procedures to comply with the BSA, the PATRIOT Act and other anti-money laundering (AML) initiatives. History East West Bancorp, Inc. was founded in 1998. The company was incorporated in Delaware in 1998.

Country
Industry:
Commercial banks
Founded:
1998
IPO Date:
02/08/1999
ISIN Number:
I_US27579R1041
Address:
135 North Los Robles Avenue, 7th Floor, Pasadena, California, 91101, United States
Phone Number
626 768 6000

Key Executives

CEO:
Ng, Dominic
CFO
Del Moral-Niles, Christopher
COO:
Shi, Parker