Steel to Become Wachovia CEO

Wachovia, one of the nation's largest banks, announced Wednesday that it has appointed Robert K. Steel, 56, chairman of the Duke Board of Trustees and recent undersecretary of the U.S. Department of Treasury, as the company's new chief executive officer and president. All business unit and staff functions will report to Steel.

Steel was appointed undersecretary of the treasury for domestic finance in October 2006. In that capacity, he served as the principal adviser to the treasury secretary on matters of domestic finance and led the department's activities with respect to the domestic financial system, fiscal policy and operations, governmental assets and liabilities and related economic and financial matters.

Steel grew up near Duke's East Campus and attended Durham public schools before enrolling at Duke. He received his bachelor of arts degree from Duke in 1973, majoring in history and political science, and earned his master's in business administration from the University of Chicago in 1984. He has maintained strong ties with Duke through activities that include chairing the Duke Management Company and serving on the trustees' academic affairs committee and on the health system board of directors.

He had a long and distinguished career at Goldman Sachs, from which he retired as a vice chairman in February 2004.

From February 2004 to September 2006, Steel served as a senior fellow at the Center for Business and Government at the John F. Kennedy School of Government at Harvard University.

For more information about the appointment, click here. For more about Steel, click here.