Dick Kavacevich, Wells' retired CEO, often told me that he recognized that for many people going to the bank was the only financial transaction that they were ever involved in. For the elderly, it was also a social call. Therefore, Mr. Kovacevich felt strongly that customers should be greeted when they entered the branch and that the visit should be a positive experience. I can honestly state that no one ever greeted me when I entered my local branch.

That type of experience posed a conundrum. On one hand, Mr. Bove considers Wells Fargo one of America's best-run banks. On the other, his personal-banking interactions with the institution have been "unacceptable." What's more, Wachovia, where Mr. Bove once did his banking, "excelled" at customer service. Of course, that bank failed. "What my Wells Fargo experience suggests is that a successful bank is one that keeps seeking new customers and selling them more products and not getting bogged down by offering service," wrote Mr. Bove.

Some other beefs:

Treated like a small fry. "I entered the branch with a low six figure check. ...It is interesting to note that no one at the branch suggested any investment to me but simply deposited the check. No one ever called me to indicate that there was over six figures sitting in a no interest checking account. The lack of contact on this issue is directly contrary to the bank’s statements to analysts that these amounts are flagged and cross-selling options are suggested."

Loan application runaround. "After four months of providing information, and a new round of questions, I decided I had, had enough and I withdrew my application for refinance. A week later Wells sent me a note saying that it was denying my refinance application. This of course has an impact on my credit rating."

Unexplained fees. "There is now a Commercial Personal Finance Access fee that is charged monthly on my personal account. I have no idea what this is and simply pay it rather than get involved with Wells bureaucracy. Additionally there is a fee that gets charged every month and then withdrawn. There is no explanation for what is happening here either but as the saying goes 'let sleeping dogs lie.'"

It doesn't take much squinting to hear those words coming from the mouth of a consumer advocate, so for the heck of it we called Ed Mierzwinski, the consumer program director at U.S. PIRG, who didn't know who Mr. Bove was/hasn't been watching much Bloomberg TV. "The big banks have a commodity product and they sell through advertising and ubiquity," Mr. Mierzwinski said. "I think the façade around the banks is starting to crumble and I think that this analyst is picking up on it."

Mr. Mierzwinski added that smaller banks and credit unions might offer a friendlier experience, though that advice arrived too late to do our protagonist any good.

"I must admit that I have been closing accounts that I have had with Wells Fargo and moving the funds to JPMorgan Chase (JPM/$34.47/Under Valued)," he wrote. "This bank is attempting to penetrate the Tampa, Florida market and is actually providing a service that is equal to the service once offered in this market by Wachovia."

Deposits in German banks rose 4.4 percent against the year before, as uh, Greeks, Spanish and Irish wised up.

European takeovers are down 23 percent year-to-date, by the way.

Ben speaks: Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke said the central bank was watching the European situation closely, but gave no indication that further monetary stimulus was imminent.

The Fed will hold all U.S. banks to the regulatory schema known as Basel III, and The Wall Street Journal is shocked that smaller lenders weren't exempted.

Mr. Bernanke also warned Congress not to ignore the so-called fiscal cliff that arrives when Bush tax cuts expire at the end of 2012. “If you all go on vacation, it’s still going to happen,” he said.

Here all week: The New York Times' Peter Lattman reports on Goldman Sachs CEO Lloyd Blankfein's testimony yesterday in U.S. v. Gupta. “You became the No. 1 person at Goldman Sachs,” [defense counsel Gary P.] Naftalis said. Mr. Blankfein corrected him. “Chairman and chief executive is my official title,” Mr. Blankfein said. He then broke into a smile. “No. 1’s not an official title.” Blankfein will testify today, as the trial drags on.

Shareholders spring: Chesapeake Energy holds its annual shareholder meeting today in Oklahoma City. Could be a good one.

So sorry: Nomura Holdings apologized to shareholders for its involvement in three insider-trading cases.

Oops: Floyd Norris says MF Global was yet another case of accounting practices that "produced profits that vanished before they were actually realized."

After Goldman: Paul Deighton, a Goldman Sachs investment banker for 22 years, is the guy running the show at the London Olympics.

Banker passes: Former Wachovia chief executive officer John Medlin died at 78.

Questions for Jamie: Andrew Ross Sorkin has some questions for Jamie Dimon ahead of the JPMorgan chief executive's visit with the Senate Banking Committee on June 13. The hearing should be used as an opportunity to draw out information on the risks in the U.S. banking system, and not merely another performance of "Washington Gotcha Theater."

JPMorgan may report a second-quarter loss of $4.2 billion in its chief investment office, ISI analyst Ed Najarian said in a research note.

Whither Europe: A Spanish budget minister urged European leaders to move faster to support Spain's floundering banks, noting that spiking borrowing rates left Spain effectively locked out of capital markets.

Shall we lunch? Goldman Sachs CEO Lloyd Blankfein testified in the insider trading trial of former-McKinsey & Co. boss Rajat Gupta yesterday, but The Times reports the testimony was largely uneventful. The lone bright spot? Mr. Blankfein asked if the court would schedule the continuation of his testimony around a lunch the bank boss had planned for his daughter's high school graduation. The Blankfeins' reservation was for a restaurant in Yonkers, where Judge Jed Rakoff lives. Did His Honor know the place? “If it’s the one I’m thinking of, I can’t afford it,” Judge Rakoff said.

KKR brass tops list: Henry Kravis was the most highly paid executive at large U.S. financial firms last year, earning $30 million in salary and other compensation, while partner George Roberts was second at $29.9 million, according to Bloomberg Markets Magazine. Mr. Kravis and Mr. Roberts, founding partners of KKR, the private equity firm that went public in 2010, took home an additional $64.2 million in dividends and other distributions accrued to their stakes in the company.

Emerging market: Steve Wynn's newest Macau casino will cost $4 billion to build, even as the island-gambling destination reported slower revenue growth.

Banker passes: Marion O. Sandler, the pioneering Wall Street woman who built Golden West Financial into one of the largest thrifts in the country, is dead at 81. Ms. Sandler and her husband Herbert sold Golden West to Wachovia in 2006, and came in for a share of blame when the bottom fell out of the U.S. housing market. The Sandlers sank much of the $2.4 billion they reaped from the Golden West sale into charities, The Times reports, including ProPublica, the investigative journalism outfit.

A partnership of Joseph Chetrit and Yair Levy, spearheaded by Charles Dayan from Bonjour Capital, bought the building for $289.8 million in 2005, according to city records. But with the trendy Chelsea office market enjoying a boom, driven in no small part by the tech bubble, the building could sell for around $500 million, according to some sources.

The owners took out a $235 million mortgage from Wachovia in 2006 and were close to default a few years later, according to The Real Deal.

The building currently has five tenants, including two long-term office tenants until 2030, as well as Bed Bath & Beyond, Marshall’s and TJ Maxx. One-third of the retail is below market rate.

“This is the next big building,” said Doug Harmon of Eastdil Secured, who is marketing it. “They have five million people who go through every year.”

The top two floors are currently vacant, with 170,000 feet of contiguous office space, one of the few such big blocks of contiguous space left in Chelsea. Moreover, the building offers development potential, with 250,000 of additional FAR on top of the building and an adjacent site of 75,000 feet that could potentially serve as a hotel development.

“The market is on the move,” Mr. Harmon said. “Where would you want to work and live if you could?”

lkusisto@observer.com

In September 2008, when the entire financial world seemed to be coming apart, an enfeebled Wachovia was set to merge with Citigroup in the kind of government-sanctioned shotgun wedding that was fashionable at the time. As part of that deal, the government agreed to backstop some losses on Wachovia's highly troubled asset portfolio. Days later, in came Wells Fargo, which trumped Citi's offer by doing the deal without government aid.

Predictably, Citigroup got all grumpy about this -- of the big banks, it was largely left out of the fire-sale acquisition game -- and so it sued Wells and Wachovia for a whopping $60 billion for breach of an exclusivity deal. (It's also worth noting that Citi was probably the poorer match for Wachovia, in that it later accepted $45 billion in government bailout money and retains Uncle Sam as an investor to this day.)

"We are glad to put this matter behind us and we look forward to our two institutions working together constructively in the future," both companies said in a statement. And so one of the great love triangles of the financial crisis draws to a conclusion that's being spun as happy by the banks' respective public relations departments.

mtaylor [at] observer.com | @mbrookstaylo0r