Another American multi-generational family bank bites the dust, only to rise again
Chris Hamblin, Editor, Editor, London, 27 January 2015
The Office of the Comptroller of the Currency has ordered the winding-up of a Florida private bank.
The OCC has appointed the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation as receiver for the First National Bank of Crestview, described by its outgoing chairman Jake Wingard as a 'multi-generational family bank'. The private bank has approximately 5,000 customers and $85 million total in assets. Crestview is in Florida.
The OCC acted after finding that the bank had experienced substantial dissipation of assets and earnings due to unsafe and unsound practices. The regulator - which somehow escaped closure after revelations in 2012 that HSBC had been laundering millions of dollars for drug cartels under the very noses of the OCC's own staff who were 'embedded' at the bank - also found that the bank incurred losses that depleted its capital. It added in a communiqué that the bank was critically undercapitalised and that there was no reasonable prospect that it would ever find a remedy for that problem.
The FDIC will release information about the resolution of the bank. The Crestview News Bulletin, however, suggests that the bank has found a buyer - First NBC Bank of New Orleands, which offers trust, custodial and investment services. The extent to which the regulators were involved in the deal is unknown.