People’s United Financial Chairman and CEO Jack Barnes sits in the corner office of Connecticut’s largest home-state bank.
Although based in Bridgeport, Barnes has had his eye increasingly on Greater Hartford, recently acquiring two major community banks in the region.
Under his watch, People’s has spent more than $1.3 billion in the past few years gobbling up Farmington Bank and Hartford-based United Financial Bancorp. Today, Barnes oversees 183 full-service offices and more than 3,000 employees in Connecticut alone.
It trails only Bank of America in state deposits.
Barnes has said he welcomes discussions with any bank looking for a suitor, as persistent low interest rates and the constant need to invest in technology causes smaller lenders to cast their gaze toward the scale and market power that a regional bank with $43.6 billion in deposits can offer.