Fund I Portfolio
Between 1997 and 2004, Belvedere Fund I acquired 8 community banks in Southern California and in the area surrounding Sacramento, California. The five institutions in Southern California were aggregated into the Bank of Orange County and the remaining three in Northern California were merged into Placer Sierra Bancshares. These institutions, largely underperformers at the time of acquisition, were transformed into top performing banks through targeted growth strategies, sales force enhancement and cost cutting, improving company value by 3 times over the holding period.
In 2004 these banks were integrated under a single holding company, Placer Sierra Bancshares, and listed on NASDAQ under the ticker PLSB. Wells Fargo acquired Placer Sierra Bancshares in 2007 for $645 million.
