Wells Fargo & Company is an American multinational banking and financial services holding company which is headquartered in San Francisco, California, with "hubquarters" throughout the country. It is the largest bank in the world by market value. It is the fourth largest bank in the U.S. by assets and the largest bank by market capitalization. Wells Fargo is the second largest bank in deposits, home mortgage servicing, and debit cards. Wells Fargo ranked 10th among the Forbes Global 2000 (2015) and the 30th largest company in the United States, according to Fortune 500 (2015).
In 2007 it was the only bank in the United States to be rated AAA by S&P, though its rating has since been lowered to AA- in light of the financial crisis of 2007–08. The firm's primary U.S. operating subsidiary is national bank Wells Fargo Bank, N.A., which designates its main office as Sioux Falls, South Dakota.
Wells Fargo in its present form is a result of a merger between San Francisco–based Wells Fargo & Company and Minneapolis-based Norwest Corporation in 1998 and the subsequent 2008 acquisition of Charlotte-based Wachovia. Following the mergers, the company transferred its headquarters to Wells Fargo's headquarters in San Francisco and merged its operating subsidiary with Wells Fargo's operating subsidiary in Sioux Falls.
Wells Fargo is one of the "Big Four Banks" of the United States, along with JPMorgan Chase, Bank of America, and Citigroup—its main competitors. The company operates across 35 countries and has over 70 million customers globally. In 2012, it had more than 9,000 retail branches and over 12,000 automated teller machines in 39 states and the District of Columbia. In July, 2015, Wells Fargo became the world's largest bank by market capitalization, edging past ICBC.
In February 2014 Wells Fargo was named the world's most valuable bank brand for the second year running in The Banker and Brand Finance study of the top 500 banking brands.
General Electric (GE) is an American multinational conglomerate corporation incorporated in New York. As of 2015, the company operates through the following segments: Appliances, Power and Water, Oil and Gas, Energy Management, Aviation, Healthcare, Transportation and Capital which cater to the needs of Home Appliances, Financial services, Medical device, Life Sciences, Pharmaceutical, Automotive, Software Development and Engineering industries.
In 2011, GE ranked among the Fortune 500 as the 26th-largest firm in the U.S. by gross revenue,and the 14th most profitable. As of 2012 the company was listed the fourth-largest in the world among the Forbes Global 2000, further metrics being taken into account. The Nobel Prize has twice been awarded to employees of General Electric: Irving Langmuir in 1932 and Ivar Giaever in 1973.
Contents
1 History
1.1 Formation
1.2 Public company
1.3 RCA
1.4 Television
1.5 Power generation
1.6 Computing
1.7 Acquisitions and Divestments
2 Stock
3 Corporate affairs
3.1 CEO
3.2 Businesses
3.3 Corporate recognition and rankings
4 Controversies and criticism
5 Environmental record
5.1 Pollution
5.1.1 Pollution of the Hudson River
5.2 Environmental initiatives
6 Educational initiatives
7 Content-marketing campaign
8 Legal issues
9 Political affiliation
10 Notable appearances in media
11 See also
12 References
13 Further reading
14 External links
History
Further information: General Electric timeline
Formation
General Electric in Schenectady, NY, aerial view, 1896
Plan of Schenectady plant, 1896
During 1889, Thomas Edison had business interests in many electricity-related companies: Edison Lamp Company, a lamp manufacturer in East Newark, New Jersey; Edison Machine Works, a manufacturer of dynamos and large electric motors in Schenectady, New York; Bergmann & Company, a manufacturer of electric lighting fixtures, sockets, and other electric lighting devices; and Edison Electric Light Company, the patent-holding company and the financial arm backed by J.P. Morgan and the Vanderbilt family for Edison's lighting experiments. In 1889, Drexel, Morgan & Co., a company founded by J.P. Morgan and Anthony J. Drexel, financed Edison's research and helped merge those companies under one corporation to form Edison General Electric Company which was incorporated in New York on April 24, 1889. The new company also acquired Sprague Electric Railway & Motor Company in the same year.
At about the same time, Charles Coffin, leading the Thomson-Houston Electric Company, acquired a number of competitors and gained access to their key patents. General Electric was formed through the 1892 merger of Edison General Electric Company of Schenectady, New York, and Thomson-Houston Electric Company of Lynn, Massachusetts, with the support of Drexel, Morgan & Co. Both plants continue to operate under the GE banner to this day. The company was incorporated in New York, with the Schenectady plant used as headquarters for many years thereafter. Around the same time, General Electric's Canadian counterpart, Canadian General Electric, was formed.
Public company
In 1896, General Electric was one of the original 12 companies listed on the newly formed Dow Jones Industrial Average. After 119 years, it is the only one of the original companies still listed on the Dow index, although it has not been on the index continuously.
A 23-ton diesel-electric locomotive made at the General Electric Corp. plant in Schenectady, New York
In 1911, General Electric absorbed the National Electric Lamp Association (NELA) into its lighting business. GE established its lighting division headquarters at Nela Park in East Cleveland, Ohio. Nela Park is still the headquarters for GE's lighting business.
Exxon Mobil Corp. (ExxonMobil) is an American multinational oil and gas corporation headquartered in Irving, Texas. It is the largest direct descendant of John D. Rockefeller's Standard Oil Company, and was formed on November 30, 1999 by the merger of Exxon (originally the Standard Oil Company of New Jersey) and Mobil (originally the Standard Oil Company of New York).
The world's 5th largest company by revenue, ExxonMobil is also the third largest publicly traded company by market capitalization. The company was ranked No. 6 globally in Forbes Global 2000 list in 2014. ExxonMobil was the second most profitable company in the Fortune 500 in 2014.
ExxonMobil is the largest of the world's supermajors with daily production of 3.921 million BOE. In 2008, this was approximately 3 percent of world production, which is less than several of the largest state-owned petroleum companies. When ranked by oil and gas reserves, it is 14th in the world—with less than 1 percent of the total. ExxonMobil's reserves were 25.2 billion BOE (barrels of oil equivalent) at the end of 2013 and the 2007 rates of production were expected to last more than 14 years. With 37 oil refineries in 21 countries constituting a combined daily refining capacity of 6.3 million barrels (1,000,000 m3), ExxonMobil is the largest refiner in the world,a title that was also associated with Standard Oil since its incorporation in 1870.
ExxonMobil has been subject to numerous criticisms, including the lack of speed during its cleanup efforts after the 1989 Exxon Valdez oil spill in Alaska, widely considered to be one of the world's worst oil spills in terms of damage to the environment. ExxonMobil has also drawn criticism for its history of lobbying in attempts to discredit the idea that climate change is caused by the burning of fossil fuels, something that modern scientific consensus largely thwarted. The company has also been the target of accusations of improperly dealing with human rights issues, influence on American foreign policy, and its impact on the future of nations.
JPMorgan Chase & Co. is an American multinational banking and financial services holding company headquartered in New York City. It is the largest bank in the United States, and the world's sixth largest bank by total assets, with total assets of US$2.6 trillion. It is a major provider of financial services, and according to Forbes magazine is the world's third largest public company based on a composite ranking.The hedge fund unit of JPMorgan Chase is the second largest hedge fund in the United States. The company was formed in 2000, when Chase Manhattan Corporation merged with J.P. Morgan & Co.
The J.P. Morgan brand, historically known as Morgan, is used by the investment banking, asset management, private banking, private wealth management, and treasury & securities services divisions. Fiduciary activity within private banking and private wealth management is done under the aegis of JPMorgan Chase Bank, N.A.—the actual trustee. The Chase brand is used for credit card services in the United States and Canada, the bank's retail banking activities in the United States, and commercial banking. The corporate headquarters is located at 270 Park Avenue in Midtown Manhattan, New York City. The retail and commercial bank is headquartered in Chase Tower, Chicago Loop, Chicago, Illinois, U.S. JPMorgan Chase & Co. is considered to be a universal bank.
JPMorgan Chase is one of the Big Four banks of the United States, along with Bank of America, Citigroup, and Wells Fargo.According to Bloomberg, as of October 2011, JPMorgan Chase had surpassed Bank of America as the largest U.S. bank by assets.
Contents
1 History
1.1 Chemical Banking Corporation
1.2 Chase Manhattan Bank
1.3 J.P. Morgan & Company
1.4 Bank One Corporation
1.5 Bear Stearns
1.6 Washington Mutual
1.7 2013 settlement
1.8 Other recent acquisitions
1.9 Acquisition history
1.10 Recent News
2 Structure
2.1 JPMorgan Europe, Ltd.
3 Financial data
4 Operations
4.1 History
5 Lobbying
6 Controversies
6.1 National Mortgage Settlement
6.2 Speculative trading
6.3 Conflicts of interest on investment research
6.4 Enron
6.5 WorldCom
6.6 Jefferson County, Alabama
6.7 Failure to comply with client money rules in the UK
6.8 Mortgage overcharge of active military personnel
6.9 Truth in Lending Act litigation
6.10 Alleged manipulation of energy market
6.11 Criminal investigation into obstruction of justice
6.12 Sanctions violations
6.13 Mortgage-backed securities sales
6.14 "Sons and Daughters" hiring program
6.15 Madoff fraud
6.16 Corruption investigation in Asia
6.17 September 2014 cyber-attack
7 Offices
8 Credit derivatives
8.1 Multibillion-dollar trading loss
9 Art collection
10 Major sponsorships
11 Notable former employees
11.1 Business
11.2 Politics and public service
11.3 Other
12 See also
12.1 Index products
13 References
14 External links
Berkshire Hathaway Inc. is an American multinational conglomerate holding company headquartered in Omaha, Nebraska, United States. The company wholly owns GEICO, BNSF, Lubrizol, Dairy Queen, Fruit of the Loom, Helzberg Diamonds, FlightSafety International, and NetJets, owns 26% of Kraft Heinz Company and an undisclosed percentage of Mars, Incorporated, and has significant minority holdings in American Express, The Coca-Cola Company, Wells Fargo, IBM and Restaurant Brands International. Berkshire Hathaway averaged an annual growth in book value of 19.7% to its shareholders for the last 49 years (compared to 9.8% from the S&P 500 with dividends included for the same period), while employing large amounts of capital, and minimal debt.
The company is known for its control and leadership by Warren Buffett, who is the company's Chairman of the Board, President, and Chief Executive Officer, and Charlie Munger, the company's Vice-Chairman of the Board of Directors. In the early part of Buffett's career at Berkshire, he focused on long-term investments in publicly traded companies, but more recently he more frequently bought whole companies. Berkshire now owns a diverse range of businesses including confectionery, retail, railroad, home furnishings, encyclopedias, manufacturers of vacuum cleaners, jewelry sales, newspaper publishing, manufacture and distribution of uniforms, and several regional electric and gas utilities.
According to the Forbes Global 2000 list and formula, Berkshire Hathaway is the fifth largest public company in the world. On August 14, 2014, the price of the company's 'A' shares hit $200,000 per share for the first time in the history of the company.
Contents
1 History
2 Corporate affairs
2.1 Governance
2.2 Succession plans
3 Businesses and investments
3.1 Insurance group
3.2 Utilities and energy group
3.3 Manufacturing, service and retailing
3.3.1 Clothing
3.3.2 Building products
3.3.3 Flight services
3.3.4 Retail
3.3.5 Media
3.3.6 Other non-insurance
3.4 Finance and financial products
3.5 Investments
3.5.1 Equities – beneficial ownership
3.5.2 Other
4 Assets
5 Notes
6 External links
History
Berkshire Cotton Mills, Adams, Mass.
Hathaway Mills, New Bedford, Mass.
Berkshire Hathaway traces its roots to a textile manufacturing company established by Oliver Chace in 1839 as the Valley Falls Company in Valley Falls, Rhode Island. Chace had previously worked for Samuel Slater, the founder of the first successful textile mill in America. Chace founded his first textile mill in 1806. In 1929 the Valley Falls Company merged with the Berkshire Cotton Manufacturing Company established in 1889, in Adams, Massachusetts. The combined company was known as Berkshire Fine Spinning Associates.
In 1955 Berkshire Fine Spinning Associates merged with the Hathaway Manufacturing Company which had been founded in 1888 in New Bedford, Massachusetts by Horatio Hathaway with profits from whaling and the China Trade. Hathaway had been successful in its first decades, but it suffered during a general decline in the textile industry after World War I. At this time, Hathaway was run by Seabury Stanton, whose investment efforts were rewarded with renewed profitability after the Depression. After the merger Berkshire Hathaway had 15 plants employing over 12,000 workers with over $120 million in revenue and was headquartered in New Bedford. However, seven of those locations were closed by the end of the decade, accompanied by large layoffs.
In 1962, Warren Buffett began buying stock in Berkshire Hathaway after noticing a pattern in the price direction of its stock whenever the company closed a mill. Eventually, Buffett acknowledged that the textile business was waning and the company's financial situation was not going to improve. In 1964, Stanton made an oral tender offer of $111⁄2 per share for the company to buy back Buffett's shares. Buffett agreed to the deal. A few weeks later, Warren Buffett received the tender offer in writing, but the tender offer was for only $113⁄8. Buffett later admitted that this lower, undercutting offer made him angry. Instead of selling at the slightly lower price, Buffett decided to buy more of the stock to take control of the company and fire Stanton (which he did). However, this put Buffett in a situation where he was now majority owner of a textile business that was failing.
Buffett initially maintained Berkshire's core business of textiles, but by 1967, he was expanding into the insurance industry and other investments. Berkshire first ventured into the insurance business with the purchase of National Indemnity Company. In the late 1970s, Berkshire acquired an equity stake in the Government Employees Insurance Company (GEICO), which forms the core of its insurance operations today (and is a major source of capital for Berkshire Hathaway's other investments). In 1985, the last textile operations (Hathaway's historic core) were shut down.
In 2010, Buffett claimed that purchasing Berkshire Hathaway was the biggest investment mistake he had ever made, and claimed that it had denied him compounded investment returns of about $200 billion over the subsequent 45 years. Buffett claimed that had he invested that money directly in insurance businesses instead of buying out Berkshire Hathaway (due to what he perceived as a slight by an individual), those investments would have paid off several hundredfold.
Bank of China Limited (simplified Chinese: 中国银行; traditional Chinese: 中國銀行; pinyin: Zhōngguó Yínháng; often abbreviated as 中銀 (in Hong Kong) or 中行 (in mainland)) is one of the 5 biggest state-owned commercial banks in China.
It was founded in 1912 by the Republican government to replace the Imperial Bank of China. It is the oldest bank in mainland China still in existence. From its establishment until 1942, it issued banknotes on behalf of the Government along with the "Big Four" banks of the period: the Farmers Bank of China, Bank of Communications and Central Bank of the Republic of China. Its headquarters are in Xicheng District, Beijing.
As of 31 December 2009, it was the second largest lender in China overall, and the 5th largest bank in the world by market capitalization value. As of 30 June 2015, it has the third highest proportion of interest payable of Chinese companies.
Contents
1 History
2 Timeline of overseas activities
3 Hong Kong
4 Basic facts
5 Banknotes
6 Ownership
7 Issues
7.1 Guarantee scandal in Poland
7.2 Wultz v. Bank of China
7.3 Alleged money transfers to Hamas
7.4 Money laundering
8 See also
9 References
10 Resources
11 External links
History
Bank of China Headquarters, Beijing, China. Architecture by I. M. Pei.
Daqing Bank's Dalian Branch (1910), now Dalian branch of China CITIC Bank
The Bank of China's history began in 1905, when the Qing government established Daqing Hubu Bank[5] (in Chinese: 大清户部銀行) in Beijing, which was in 1908 renamed to Daqing Bank (in Chinese: 大清銀行). When the Republic of China was established in 1912, it was further renamed as Bank of China by President Sun Yat-sen's government, adding a new role of the central bank.
After the Chinese Civil War ended in 1949, the Bank of China effectively split into two operations. Part of the bank relocated to Taiwan with the Kuomintang (KMT) government. It was privatised in 1971 to become the International Commercial Bank of China (中國國際商業銀行). It has subsequently merged with the Taiwan Bank of Communications (Chiao Tung Bank, 交通銀行) to become the Mega International Commercial Bank (兆豐國際商業銀行). The Mainland operation is the current entity known as the Bank of China.
It is the second largest lender in China overall, and the fifth largest bank in the world by market capitalization value. Once 100% owned by the central government, via China Central Huijin and National Council for Social Security Fund (SSF), an Initial public offering (IPO) of its shares took place in June 2006, the free float is at present over 26%. In the Forbes Global 2000 it ranked as the 21st-largest company in the world.
It is the most international of China's banks, with branches on every inhabited continent. Outside of mainland China, BOC also operates in 27 countries and areas including Australia, Canada, United Kingdom, Ireland, France, Germany, Italy, Luxembourg, Russia, Hungary, United States, Panama, Brazil, Japan, Republic of Korea, Singapore, Taiwan, Philippines, Vietnam, Malaysia, Thailand, Indonesia, Kazakhstan, Bahrain, Zambia, South Africa, and a branch office in the Cayman Islands. In December 2010, the Bank of China New York branch began offering renminbi products for Americans. It was the first major Chinese bank to offer such a product.
Although it is present in the above countries/territories, its operations outside China accounted for less than 4% of the activity of the bank by both profits and assets. Mainland China accounts for 60% of the bank by profits and 76% by assets as at December 2005.
The tech giant celebrates its sixth year at No. 1 and recently bolstered its parental leave benefits. New parents, regardless of gender (including dads, domestic partners, adoptive parents, and surrogate parents), can now get up to twelve weeks of fully paid baby bonding time. Google also provides $500 of “Baby Bonding Bucks” to all new parents to use during the first three months of their child’s life.
Company Info
CEO/Top Executive Larry Page
Rank last year 1
# of years on list 9
F500 Rank 46
Industry Information Technology
Year founded 1998
Type of organization Public
Revenue (2014 or most recent year) $55.5 billion
Web address http://www.google.com
Total US employees 44862
Full-Time jobs added in last year 4514
Number of work sites -
Perks
Offers compressed work weeks
Offers fully-paid sabbaticals
Offers paid time off for volunteering
Onsite fitness center
Discounted gym memberships
Onsite medical care facility
Offers college tuition reimbursement to employees
Diversity
Women 28%
Minorities -
African-American 1%
Asian 18%
Native Hawaiian Pacific Islander
Caucasian or White 38%
Hispanic/Latino 1%
Native American/Alaska Native
Two or more races 2%
Same-Sex Benefits
Non-discrimination policy
Paid Time Off
Holidays 13
Vacation 15
Sick days Unlimited
General PTO
Compensation
Most common job (hourly) Associate Account Strategist, BA Program (US)
Avg. base pay (for hourly employee) -
Avg. extra comp. (for hourly employee) -
Most common job (salaried) Software Engineer III
Avg. base pay (for salaried employee) -
Avg. extra comp (for salaried employee) -
Hiring/Staffing
FT voluntary turnover -
of job applicants 1267959
Avg. # of applicants per opening 140
of jobs filled -
Jobs filled internally -
% of jobs filled by referral -
new graduates hired -
of job openings (as of Feb. 2015)
