Hugh McColl

Who is Hugh McColl?

Hugh L. McColl Jr. is a fourth-generation banker and the former Chairman and CEO of Bank of America.

McColl was a driving force behind consolidating a series of progressively larger, mostly Southern banks, thrifts and financial institutions into a super-regional banking force, "the first ocean-to-ocean bank in the nation's history" — a transformation that Tony Plath, director of banking studies at the University of North Carolina at Charlotte, called in 2005 "the most significant banking story of the late 20th century" and that polemicist Matt Taibbi called in 2012 "a cartoonish arms race of bank acquisitions that would ultimately turn the American business world upside down."

As a young man, McColl along with a colleague had envisioned creating the first truly national bank with branches from coast to coast.