Bank One Corporation
Bank One Corporation was the sixth-largest bank in the United States. It traded on the New York Stock Exchange under the stock symbol ONE. The company merged with JPMorgan Chase & Co. on July 1, 2004. The company had its headquarters in the Bank One Plaza (now the Chase Tower) in the Chicago Loop in Chicago, Illinois, now the headquarters of Chase's retail banking division.
The bank traces its roots to the Ohio-based First Banc Group, that was formed in 1968 as a holding company for the City National Bank in Columbus, Ohio.
History
History of Banc One Corporation
First Banc Group
The First Banc Group, Inc. was formed in 1968 as a holding company for City National Bank and was used as a vehicle to acquire other banks. As Ohio began to gradually relax its very restrictive Great Depression era banking laws that had severely restricted bank branching and ownership, City National Bank, through its First Banc Group parent, started to purchase banks outside of its home county. The first acquisition by the new bank holding company was the 1968 acquisition of the Farmers Saving & Trust Company in Mansfield, Ohio. With each acquisition, new member banks kept their name, employees and management while obtaining new resources from the parent holding company. This is very important when the bank holding company was expanding into primarily rural and extremely conservative markets.