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Tuesday July 10, 7:06 pm Eastern Time
NEWSMAKER-Bush Fed pick Olson savvy on politics, banking
By Marjorie Olster
NEW YORK, July 10 (Reuters) - Mark Olson, who is set to be nominated to the powerful Federal Reserve Board of Governors, will deepen the U.S. central bank's pool of knowledge on community banking and regulatory issues and bring a first-hand knowledge of Washington politics to the key job as well.
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President George W. Bush said on Tuesday he planned to nominate Olson, 58, to fill a vacant seat on the seven-member Fed Board where he will sit on the committee that sets U.S. interest rates.
Olson, a Republican with a bachelor's degree in economics, had most recently served as staff director of the securities subcommittee of the Senate Banking Committee, the White House said.
Olson's resume boasts an unusual combination of Washington politics and banking. He started out in banking in 1966, took a few years hiatus to work in politics, then headed a small bank that was started by his father in rural Minnesota.
In 1986 he went on to become the youngest president of one of the country's biggest and most influential trade groups, the American Bankers Association.
Bankers said Olson, as a former bank chief executive, would bring to the Fed valuable practical experience that would aid him in making critical decisions on monetary policy and bank regulation.
``He's just a good, thoughtful guy,'' said Jim McLaughlin, director of regulatory affairs at the ABA, adding Olson brings "a tremendous breadth of experience and knowledge.
``There should be someone on the Board of Governors with real on-the-ground banking experience and he certainly has that,'' McLaughlin added.
Olson served as ABA president from 1986-1987, a high-profile job that overlapped with his work from 1976-1988 as president and CEO of Security First Bank of Fergus Falls, Minn.
He sold the family bank and joined Ernst & Young LLP in Washington, D.C., in 1988 as a partner, managing the firm's financial services regulatory consulting practice.
``I must confess, I never did shake my Potomac fever,'' Olson said of his love for the nation's capital in an interview with the American Banker in 1998.
He left Ernst & Young in 1999 and worked for Sen. Rod Grams, a Minnesota Republican, as the staff director of the securities subcommittee Grams chaired. He remained in that post through 2000. Grams served on the Senate Banking Committee until he lost his bid for reelection last year.
Olson first learned to navigate the corridors of Capitol Hill in the early 1970s when he worked as legislative director to Rep. Bill Frenzel, another Minnesota Republican, who was a member of the House Banking Committee.
If there was any doubt about his banking credentials, Olson is also an avid golfer, the banker's game of choice. And banking appears to be in his blood -- both his father and grandfather were bankers.
Paul Lindholm, the current chairman and CEO of Security State Bank, which has 20 employees and $65 million in assets, described Olson as a man of ``absolute integrity.''
Lindholm said he closed the 1988 deal to buy the bank from Olson over the telephone. ``We didn't use an attorney, we used an accountant,'' he recalled.
``He's just a genuine Midwesterner,'' said Anne Cashman, 62, who grew up with Olson in Fergus Falls, a small, mainly agricultural town. ``He couldn't be any nicer.''
Olson graduated from St. Olaf College in Northfield, Minn., with a bachelor's degree in economics in 1965.
He has two children, Ben, 28, and Stephanie, 18. Stephanie recently graduated from high school and is headed to Penn State University in the fall.
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