TD Bank completes Commerce purchase

CHERRY HILL, N.J. – The marriage between two unusual banks is complete.

Toronto-based TD Bank Financial Group closed on its $8.5 billion purchase of Cherry Hill-based Commerce Bancorp on Monday, creating a chain of branches spanning much of the East Coast.

The deal was announced last year after Commerce ousted founder Vernon Hill as part of a deal with regulators who were concerned that Hill was giving bank contracts to firms that he and his family controlled.

Over 35 years, Hill’s aggressive growth strategy in branches made his upstart bank into the largest one based in New Jersey.

The new bank will be known as TD Commerce Bank and will be based in Cherry Hill and Portland, Maine, where TD’s U.S. banking operation has its headquarters. Its parent company also runs the second-largest bank in Canada.

The company says the acquisition makes TD Bank Financial Group among the seven largest banking operations in North America.

TD executives say they will retain Commerce’s customer-friendly customs such as Sunday lobby hours and handing out lollipops to children and biscuits to dogs.

They’re also borrowing a Commerce slogan, calling the combined operation “America’s Most Convenient Bank.”

Also on Monday, Worcester, Mass.-based Commerce Bank & Trust Co. sued to try to stop TD from using the Commerce name in Massachusetts, where the Worcester-based bank has 12 branches.