News Releases

Harris Nesbitt Expands Equity Research by Hiring Real Estate Team and Capital Goods Analyst

NEW YORK, August 3 , 2005 – Harris Nesbitt, the U.S. investment and corporate banking arm of BMO Financial Group (NYSE, TSX: BMO), today announced the hiring of a team of equity research analysts to cover Real Estate Investment Trusts (REITs) as well as the recent hiring of a Capital Goods research analyst.

Joining the firm are senior analysts Paul Adornato and Richard Anderson, covering REITs, and Charles Brady, covering Capital Goods. Mr. Brady is based in the firm's Boston office, while Mr. Adornato and Mr. Anderson, and their research associate Ralph Davies, Jr., are based in New York.

"In the past four months we've added research coverage in four new sectors or industries," said Jack Blackstock, Head of U.S. Equity Research and Sales, Harris Nesbitt. In addition to REITs and Capital Goods, Harris Nesbitt also expanded into Financial Institutions early this year, and last month added Natural Gas Pipelines to its Energy & Power coverage. Mr. Blackstock noted, "We continue our strategy of broadening our research universe into sectors that are important to our institutional clients and to the markets at large."

Mr. Adornato and Mr. Anderson join Harris Nesbitt from independent equity firm Maxcor Financial, where they headed the REIT research effort, covering names in Office, Industrial, Storage, Manufactured Homes, Multi-family, Healthcare, and Retail sectors.

Prior to their work together at Maxcor, Mr. An derson worked at Smith Barney as a senior member of the REIT research team, top-ranked by Institutional Investor. The team originated at PaineWebber, also top-ranked by Institutional Investor, and included Mr. Adornato as a senior member. Mr. Anderson earned his MBA at Monmouth University and his B.S. in Aerospace Engineering at the University of Maryland.

Previous to Maxcor, Mr. Adornato founded Cobblestone Research, LLC, an independent research boutique. He holds an M.S. from Massachusetts Institute of Technology and a B.A. from Dartmouth College.

With more than 11 years of experience in equity research, Mr. Brady comes to Harris Nesbitt from Hibernia Southcoast Capital in New Orleans, where he covered Capital Goods and Diversified Industrials since 2003. In May, the 2004 Forbes/StarMine "Best Equity Analyst" survey ranked Mr. Brady as the top stock picker for the Machinery sector. Mr. Brady graduated with a B.S. in Finance from the University of Florida.

"Our new REIT and Capital Goods coverage will help to underscore our market position as an action-oriented, idea-based research department," added Mr. Blackstock.

Harris Nesbitt Equity Research now covers more than 275 companies in sectors that also include Business Services, Consumer & Leisure, Food & Agribusiness, Healthcare, Media & Entertainment and Technology & Telecommunications. A complete list of the firm's equity analyst team and coverage universe can be viewed at: http://corporate.bmo.com/research/equities/default.asp?hnnav=1.

Harris Nesbitt is an investment and corporate bank offering clients access to a full range of products and services including investment and corporate banking, treasury services, market risk management, institutional investing and research. Harris Nesbitt is part of Harris, an integrated financial services organization providing more than 1.5 million personal, business, corporate and institutional clients with banking, lending, investing and financial management solutions. Harris Nesbitt is a member of BMO Financial Group (NYSE, TSX: BMO). For more information, please visit www.harrisnesbitt.com.

Contacts:
Kevin Windorf, New York, (212) 885-4111
Chris Nardella, Chicago, (312) 461-6625
Kim Hanson, Toronto, (416) 867-3996

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