Exhibit 99

                                                                 [LOGO] ANDERSON

                    REPORT OF INDEPENDENT PUBLIC ACCOUNTANTS

To the Shareholders and the Board of
Directors of Farmers & Merchants Bancorp:

We have audited the consolidated statements of income, changes in shareholders'
equity, cash flows and comprehensive income of Farmers & Merchants Bancorp (a
Delaware Corporation) and its subsidiaries for the year ended December 31, 1999.
These financial statements are the responsibility of the Company's management.
Our responsibility is to express an opinion on these financial statements based
on our audit.

We conducted our audit in accordance with auditing standards generally accepted
in the United States. Those standards require that we plan and perform the audit
to obtain reasonable assurance about whether the financial statements are free
of material misstatement. An audit includes examining, on a test basis, evidence
supporting the amounts and disclosures in the financial statements. An audit
also includes assessing the accounting principles used and significant estimates
made by management, as well as evaluating the overall financial statement
presentation. We believe that our audit provides a reasonable basis for our
opinion.

In our opinion, the financial statements referred to above present fairly, in
all material respects, the results of operations and cash flows of Farmers &
Merchants Bancorp and its subsidiaries for the year ended December 31, 1999 in
conformity with accounting principles generally accepted in the United States.


/s/ Arthur Andersen LLP
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San Francisco, California,
   February 4, 2000

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