Which bank CEO navigated the choppy waters of the banking industry best in 2009?

I’m going to get some flack for this, but I’m going to vote for John Stumpf of Wells Fargo & Co. Here’s why:

* The Wachovia deal seems to have put Wells into a whole other stratosphere. Wells’s assets jumped 110% by the end of the second quarter on a year-over-year basis to $1.28 trillion, good enough for fourth in the nation. No other bank has grown like that in 2009 — no other major bank is even close. With the deal, banking in the US has become a three-horse race between JP Morgan Chase, Wells and Bank of America. You’ve got to tip your hat to Stumpf for that.

* Wells outplayed Citigroup on its TARP repay/equity raise this month. It was Wells that sucked up the demand for bank stock among investors that led Treasury to forgo a sale of its Citi warrants, effectively hampering Citi’s exit from TARP. And Wells did it without incurring a PR hit; instead it was Treasury that looked like the villain. Quite a feat.

* Wells largely avoided the executive compensation brouhaha that swirled around TARP banks for most of the year. That it did so as the fourth-largest bank in the nation is remarkable.

Generally, Wells kept its head down and its P&L humming in 2009. You’ve got to give Stumpf credit for that. Jamie Dimon of JP Morgan Chase might be Wall Street’s golden boy, but Stumpf has kept Wells on track, despite it all. CEO of the Year: Stumpf.