Pasadena Bank Receives Top Rating, Outperforms Two Nation’s Largest Institutions

Pasadena-based East West Bancorp, Inc., which owns and operates East West Bank, has received the ‘Best Board’ ranking in Bank Director’s 2022 Ranking Banking study, which identifies the best banks in the U.S.

East West Bancorp outperformed two of the largest banks in the country – U.S. Bancorp and JP Morgan Chase and Co., which placed second and third, Bank Director said.

Bank Director (www.bankdirector.com) is a privately-held information resource company based in Brentwood, Tennessee that has been serving the financial community since 1991 and focuses on the strategic issues most fundamental to a bank’s CEO, senior leadership team, chairman and independent directors.

Earlier this year, Bank Director cited East West Bancorp as the No. 1 Performing Bank in their 2021 Bank Performance Scorecard for banks in the $50-billion-and-above asset category.

The statement added East West Bancorp earned the Best Board ranking “due to its diverse, skilled board and strong governance practices.”

“I’m delighted that the leadership, diversity, and strong governance of our board have been recognized with the Best Board ranking,” Dominic Ng, Chairman, President and CEO of East West Bank, said. “I have always believed that there is strength in diversity. This recognition demonstrates that diversity also contributes to our strong financial performance and customer-centric focus.”

East West Bancorp’s eight-member board includes three women and six members representing diverse ethnic and racial backgrounds.

That diversity enriches deliberations, according to board member Molly Campbell, an African American who’s also infrastructure advisor with the U.S. Department of Treasury’s Office of Technical Assistance.

“We have so many broad perspectives in the room,” Campbell said. “We’re not all in agreement all the time, (but) we’re comfortable with expressing our opinions and making the bank that much better.”

Data used in the 2022 RankingBanking analysis was collected through S&P Global Market Intelligence, publicly available information, Securities and Exchange Commission filings, and other outlets.

The 2022 Best Boards rankings are available at www.bankdirector.com/rankingbanking/best-boards.

The 2021 Bank Performance Scorecard, an annual ranking of the 300 largest publicly-traded banks in the U.S., is published in the third quarter 2021 issue of Bank Director and is available at www.bankdirector.com/magazine/archives/3rd-quarter-2021/steady-in-the-storm.

East West Bancorp, Inc., a public company with total assets of over $61 billion, owns East West Bank, which has its headquarters at 135 N. Los Robles Ave. in Pasadena and operates over 120 locations in the U.S. and in China.

For more information, visit www.eastwestbank.com.