New Jersey Market is Key to Fleet/Summit Deal

PRINCETON, NJ-The headline is that FleetBoston is acquiring Summit Bancorp, based here, for $7 billion in an all-stock deal. It has implications for the real estate community in New Jersey if for no other reason than Summit, the largest NJ-based bank, is a major lender and asset-holder. Summit traces its roots to 1861 when it was Cumberland National Bank in Bridgeton, NJ and grew to its current size when it merged with United Jersey Bank two years ago. FleetBoston itself is the result of last year’s merger of Fleet Financial and BankBoston.

The consensus is that the deal came down now for two major reasons. The first is the New Jersey market itself, which Fleet entered in 1995 when it acquired Jersey City-based NatWest. NJ is the third wealthiest and most densely populated state. It has nine of the country’s 100 richest cities, and 25% of all households are worth $1 million or more. Half of the Fortune 500 are based or have major operations here.