Bank rebranding itself as ‘Popular’

Bank wants to add Broward branches

Popular Community Bank, which operates nearly a dozen branches in South Florida, is rebranding itself Monday as just Popular and intends to expand its footprint in Broward County, the institution’s top regional executive said.

Based in Miami Lakes, the South Florida arm of Popular Inc. operates 10 branches in MiamiDade County and one in Broward. But the bank intends to scout for new locations in Fort Lauderdale, Pembroke Pines and Hollywood, said Israel Velasco, Florida region executive. The sole Broward branch is in Sunrise.

“That’s what I call the next frontier for us and the biggest opportunity for growth for us,” Velasco said. “Definitely the appetite is there, and we will be looking to growin Broward County.”

He said he is less “bullish” about Palm Beach County in the short-term, as “we don’t want to be so spread out initially.”

The name change is largely about conveying to the public a perception of a larger, more expansive bank with a broader base of services ranging from condo loans and single-family residential mortgages to private banking. Popular has$9.2 billion in assets in theUnited States.

“When I started, we were Banco Popular and changed to Popular Community Bank,” Velasco said in a telephone interview. “At that point itwas the right thing for us to change. One of the challenges we had was that in the States, a lot of people perceived us as being a bank just for Hispanics or a bank for foreigners.

“We’ve outgrown the community bank name,” he added, “because we have a lot of different [service] areas not common to community banks.”

Velasco said the institution ultimately will be known as Popular “across the board.”

“We’ve already rebranded in theU.S. and BritishVirgin Islands; in the states, that’s happening on Monday,” he said.

The change eventually will take hold islandwide in Puerto Rico, where the institution got its start more than a century ago.

The new moniker, however, puzzled longtime South Florida banking analystKenThomas, who is president of Community Development Fund Advisors. He asserted that smaller banks seeking to distinguish themselves frombe-