U.S. Bancorp, the nation's largest regional lender, plans to add as many as 4,500 jobs by the end of 2015.

Chief Executive Officer Richard Davis said the Minneapolis-based bank will finish this year with about 67,000 employees and 2015 with as many as 70,000, compared with about 65,500 at the end of 2013.

Many of the new jobs will be in compliance and audit, in part to meet regulatory demands, and some will be filled by veterans and people out of work for more than six months, he said in an interview with Bloomberg Television at the annual Clearing House conference in New York.

"I don't bring people on until I'm sure that I can keep them all," Davis, 56, said. "We've been growing our market share."

U.S. Bancorp last month reported a $1.47 billion third- quarter profit, little changed from a year earlier and matching analysts' estimates. The company has countered an industrywide slump in mortgages by relying on fees from businesses including credit cards and auto financing.