Bank of America’s Brands Dominate List of Winners at 16th Annual FCS Portfolio Awards

Financial Communications Society recognizes 28 companies for excellence in financial services advertising, collateral, digital media, ROI and public relations

• Best in Show Awards won by Allstate, Barclays Capital, E*Trade, Merchants Bank, and MetLife


• MetLife and Charles Schwab take home first-ever PR awards

May 19, 2009 (New York)

At the 16th Annual FCS Annual Portfolio Awards, held on Thursday, May 13th, the Financial Communications Society (FCS) recognized 28 financial services providers for excellence in their advertising, collateral, digital media, Return on Investment, and, in a new category, Public Relations. Bank of America Merrill Lynch was the big winner, who, along with its Merrill Lynch Wealth Management and U.S. Trust brands, won a total of 12 awards, including a Gold trophy for its B2B direct mail entry. Fifth Third Bank was the next biggest winner with nine awards, including three Gold trophies for its out-of-home and interactive advertising.

Highlights:

• Barclays Capital scored a total of eight awards, including five Gold trophies (the most on the night) as well as the Best-in-Show B2B award for its iPath multimedia advertising campaign, created by Venables Bell & Partners. The multimedia category was sponsored by Bloomberg.


• MetLife, which won seven trophies in total, was awarded the Best-in-Show Multicultural award for its Chinese print campaign, created by IW Group.


• E*Trade’s "2009 Baby" television campaign won the Best-in-Show Consumer Retail award. The campaign was created by Grey New York and also won Gold in the Consumer Retail television category. E*Trade also won a Bronze in the television category, which was sponsored by CNBC.


• Allstate Insurance’s Gold trophy-winning print campaign, "Allstate Corporate Advocacy," won the Best-in-Show Corporate Image award. The campaign was created by Leo Burnett.


• The Best-in-Show Interactive Media award went to Merchants Bank, whose web site, www.vermontmatters.com, took home a Gold in the Corporate Image Web Sites Category. The site was created by Cottage 10. The web sites category was sponsored by Y INTERACT.


• In the Return on Investment (ROI) Category, Fidelity Investments received the Gold and MetLife won the Silver. The ROI awards were sponsored by MEC.


• For the first time in the 16 year history of the FCS Portfolio Awards, trophies for Excellence in Public Relations were presented. Sun Life Financial won Gold in the Corporate Image category; the campaign was coordinated by The Martin Agency, Elevate, and Tierney. Charles Schwab, with its agency Edelman, won Silver in the Consumer Retail category. The PR awards were sponsored by Gorkana


• Click here to download the complete list of Portfolio Award winners

This year's Awards competition included more than 360 entries, with Gold, Silver and Bronze trophies awarded to ROI, Public Relations, Collateral, Web Sites, and Advertising in print, television, out-of-home, direct mail, interactive and multimedia categories. Winning entries were received from financial services providers, including investment firms, credit card companies, investment banks, brokerages, insurance companies, and commercial banks.

The awards were presented at a gala dinner on May 13th at Terminal 5 in New York City. A sell-out crowd of more than 400 professionals from the financial services, media, advertising, PR and marketing industries attended the event, which was sponsored by The Wall Street Journal, LinkedIn, Investor's Business Daily/investors.com, CNBC, The Economist, and Fortune / Money.

For a full list of award winners, please visit www.fcsinteractive.com.

About The Financial Communications Society (FCS)

The Financial Communications Society (FCS), a not-for-profit organization, is dedicated to improving professional standards in financial communications. It provides professionals in the industry with a forum for gathering relevant information, sharing ideas and building relationships with industry colleagues. The FCS hosts the annual FCS Portfolio Awards, for creative excellence in financial services advertising, a monthly luncheon series featuring prominent industry speakers, and numerous educational events. The capstone of the annual charity-focused activities organized by the FCS is the FCS Race for Kids (www.fcsraceforkids.org) which has raised more than $1.35 million for three children's charities.

For more information on the FCS, please visit: www.fcsinteractive.com or send an email to info@fcsinteractive.com.