Wells Fargo 2007 Annual Report Download - page 13

11
A Message from Dick
As our company continues on its journey toward even more
industry-leading success, my active role on that trail will come to
an end in 2008. It’s time to turn over the reins to John Stumpf
and his team and for me to board the next stage. We’re very
fortunate to have John as our CEO. He’s extremely talented and
experienced in all aspects of the financial services business. He’s
been an inspirational leader and architect of our business model
and vision and values spanning over 25 years. He’s passionate
about our culture, our people, our customers, our communities
and our investors. He walks the talk. He’s smart, articulate, a
person of the highest integrity, knowledgeable, fun to be around,
a great leader, and he cares. He cares for our company and our
team. He cares about our customers, our communities and about
building wealth for customers, team members and investors.
It’s also important to recognize that the size, complexity and
growth prospects of Wells Fargo are so great that it ceased to be
run by a single CEO many, many years ago. John, like me before
him, is very fortunate to be supported by a team of CEOs. Each
of them has a group of businesses that, if they were a stand-alone
corporation, would be in the Fortune 200s in size. These very
talented, experienced senior executive vice presidents, Dave Hoyt,
Mark Oman, Carrie Tolstedt and Howard Atkins, are the CEOs
of their groups. They work with John, their fellow group heads,
the businesses and the staff groups on the vision, values and
strategy of Wells Fargo. They make it all happen.
To you, our stockholders and also to buy side /sell side equity
analysts, thank you for your incredible loyalty to Wells Fargo.
Most of you have been stockholders and supporters for many
years. Many of you for over a decade. Some came on board over
two decades ago when our journey began. I’ve enjoyed our many
meetings and discussions. It’s unusual, in today’s world, that such
investment longevity exists. I trust that the ride has been
prosperous and enjoyable for you.
To you, our board of directors, thank you for your ideas, wise
counsel and support. It took unusual courage and confidence to
allow us to follow our vision, supported by our values, while the
“herd” and the conventional wisdom often pointed in another
direction. You appropriately challenged but never wavered. Your
advice and direction contributed enormously to our success.
To you, our customers and communities, thank you for the
honor and pleasure of serving you. You’ve always been our
primary focus. We strive to give you such great service and sound
financial advice that you will give us more of your business (we
hope all of it!). You’ve, indeed, paid us the greatest honor by
coming to us for your next financial services product. That’s why
our results have been consistently among the very best in our
industry for now over two decades. You’re the reason we exist.
Most especially, a very special and sincere thanks to my
colleagues and team members. You’ve proven, beyond any doubt,
that our business is about people — about customer focus,
leadership, vision, values, caring, sharing, teamwork,
collaboration, community involvement, commitment, partnering,
optimism, hard work, ethics and integrity. You prove every day
it’s all about people as a competitive advantage. I’ve had the
distinct pleasure to have played with the best team in financial
services, perhaps the best team in corporate America. It’s no
wonder we’ve won more games and scored more points than
any of our competitors. I just wish I was 10 years younger so
I could still play with this great team. I no longer hold the reins
and will soon be just a passenger on the stagecoach — but as
we all know from our history, even passengers need to help the
stagecoach from time to time. Please let me know when I can
help you. Remember four things:
• Be the best, number one second to none.
• “Out-local” the nationals, “out-national” the locals®.
• People are our competitive advantage.
• Always care and have fun!
I will miss you more than you know.
Richard M. Kovacevich, Chairman
Two Decades of Growth: Our Foundation for the Future
1986* 2007
Assets $79 billion $575 billion
Net income $400 million $8.1 billion
Stock market value $4 billion $112 billion(1/31/08)
Earnings per share $0.18 $2.38
Team members 41,000 159,800
Stores 1,500 6,000
* Includes former Norwest and former Wells Fargo (merged 1998), and former First Security (acquired 2000)