Wells Fargo becomes biggest U.S. bank

Wells Fargo & Co., the San Francisco lender that doubled its size by buying Wachovia Corp. during the credit crisis, passed JPMorgan Chase & Co. to become the largest U.S. bank by stock market value.

Wells Fargo’s market capitalization rose to $157.6 billion at Thursday’s close of New York trading, surpassing JPMorgan’s $156.4 billion. Wells Fargo is ranked fourth by assets and deposits, while JPMorgan is second behind Bank of America Corp., and New York-based Citigroup Inc. is third.

Chief Executive John Stumpf has used acquisitions to fuel growth at Wells Fargo. The lender completed more than 55 purchases in the last five years, led by its $12.7-billion takeover of Wachovia in October 2008, according to data compiled by Bloomberg. Wells Fargo had $622.4 billion in assets in the quarter before it bought Wachovia. It held $1.2 trillion in assets at the end of September.

Wells Fargo shares rose 0.8% to $30.02. The shares have advanced 11% this year, compared with a loss of 4% at JPMorgan. The biggest stakeholder in Wells Fargo is Warren Buffett’s Berkshire Hathaway Inc.

On May 12, Wells Fargo passed Bank of America as the most valuable U.S. bank before the Charlotte, N.C., company passed it the following week on May 18, according to Bloomberg data. New York-based JPMorgan has held the lead for most of the last two years, except for the five-month period between February and July of this year when it repeatedly traded places with Bank of America.