Toronto-Dominion Bank , Canada's second-largest lender, said on Thursday it is open to doing small acquisitions in the U.S. market that would allow it to accelerate its branch rollout, especially in the southeastern part of the country. "We open about 25 to 30 new branches in the U.S. every year right through our footprint, so if there was a smallish tuck-in opportunity in the U.S. Southeast, we would certainly look at it seriously, because it would accelerate our store build-out by a few years," said Chief Executive Bharat Masrani at a roundtable with media.TD, already one of the 10 largest banks in the United States with over 1,300 branches along the eastern coast stretching from Maine to Florida, sees no pressing need to do any transformative acquisitions at this time, said Masrani."I've learned never to say never, but the great thing is we don't need to do a big deal," he said. "If something compelling comes up, we will certainly look at it, but we are not compelled to do it because there is a strategic gap in our franchise."Masrani, who headed TD's U.S. banking operations before taking over as CEO in November, said that TD remains an "organic growth type of institution," but would look for other opportunities in the U.S. market too.
The Toronto-Dominion Bank and its subsidiaries are collectively known as TD Bank Group (TD). Shares of TD fell by 0.25% or $-0.11/share to $43.05. In the past year, the shares have traded as low as $39.56 and as high as $53.49. On average, 1938940 shares of TD exchange hands on a given day and today's volume is recorded at 1086317.
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