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Monday, December 10, 2001 Headlines--- BNP Paribas,
Parent of BancWest, Will Acquire United California Bank TIPS TO CUT TAXES #### denotes Press Release ( E-mail is up again. Mail may be delayed or if sent Friday, lost. If you have not received a response, then we did not receive your e-mail. E-mail is restored now. The Colonial Pacific History is not complete due to this problem, and we hope to issue soon, if not tomorrow. editor ) _______________________________________________________________ Christmas Party-Meet the New CEO United Association of Equipment Leasing UAEL BAY
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United Association of Equipment Leasing BNP Paribas, Parent of BancWest, Will Acquire United California Bank Transaction to Create $31-Billion Regional Banking Organization In Seven Western States Makes Bank of the West Fourth-Largest California Bank SAN FRANCISCO and LOS ANGELES, -- BNP Paribas, which is soon to become parent company of BancWest Corporation (NYSE: BWE), announced today that it has signed a definitive agreement with Tokyo-headquartered UFJ Holdings to acquire its United California Bank subsidiary in a $2.4 billion cash transaction. United California Bank branches will become part of Bank of the West, a BancWest subsidiary, more than doubling Bank of the West's California presence. The acquisition will solidify BancWest's position as one of the premier western financial services franchises. Following the acquisition, BancWest will have $31 billion in assets and serve 1.5 million customers from more than 350 branches in California, six other Western states, Guam and Saipan. Bank of the West will have $15 billion in deposits within California, ranking fourth in bank deposit market share in the nation's most populous state. United California Bank, the largest Los Angeles-based bank, currently has assets of $11 billion and 117 branches throughout California. Combination to Create a New Regional Banking Leader "United California Bank rightfully prides itself on being a relationship-oriented bank, just as we do," said BancWest Chairman and Chief Executive Officer Walter A. Dods, Jr. "Their philosophy of community banking and locally based decision making is a perfect match for us. Our business lines fit together well. And because the companies have strong positions in the two largest markets in California, the logic of this combination is compelling." Don J. McGrath, president and chief operating officer of BancWest and president and chief executive officer of Bank of the West, called the transaction "a marriage of two complementary and compatible banks that makes sense both strategically and financially. We have waited patiently to enter the Southern California market until we could do so with the scale to compete successfully. With this step, we have done that. We also add to our market share in Northern and Central California, further filling in our footprint in those important regions. "This transaction will give us the opportunity to offer our brand of community banking and superior customer service throughout California. The combination of our broad product lines and our personal-touch approach to banking spells good news for customers from San Diego to San Francisco. "United California Bank's employees know their customers, and like Bank of the West, have built a strong, client-focused bank. They have major-league banking talent, plus the strong interpersonal skills to establish deep customer relationships across an ethnically diverse population," McGrath concluded. UCB Vice Chairman and newly appointed Chief Operating Officer Howard Gould said, "This transaction is a win-win for the parent companies of both banks and -- importantly -- the customers and communities we serve. UCB employees will become part of a larger, growing organization committed to California, and our customers will enjoy added statewide convenience and a broader product line. Each of our institutions has a longstanding commitment to our California communities that will only be strengthened by this new combination." Regional Headquarters to be Established in Southern California Bank of the West plans to create a regional administrative and support headquarters in the Los Angeles area, staffed largely by experienced United California Bank bankers who understand Southern California. In addition, Dods said, BancWest's track record -- 12 acquisitions in all since 1990 -- demonstrates its ability to manage integrations seamlessly. "With each acquisition, we've added assets and customers and increased our internal efficiency," he said. "We know BancWest can be successful at integrating acquisitions -- because we have been." Bank of the West expects to achieve cost savings as a result of consolidating duplicate administrative functions and a small number of overlapping branches. Both banks said that they would immediately institute a hiring freeze and expect the vast majority of the reductions in positions to be made by attrition. Combination to Offer Greater Convenience, Broader Product Line to 1.5 Million Customers The combined companies will have strengthened offerings in: -- Community banking: Both already offer decentralized decision-making and personal service to individuals and small and medium-sized businesses. Both emphasize customer service and cross selling in branches, while centralizing backup operations. -- Consumer finance, including loans for automobiles, RVs and pleasure boats. -- Residential lending. -- Commercial banking. -- Private banking, trust and investments. -- Cash management. Terms of the Transaction The transaction has been approved by the boards of directors of BNP Paribas and UFJ Holdings. The transaction is expected to close by the end of the first quarter of 2002, subject to customary regulatory and other approvals. United California Bank will then be merged into Bank of the West by the end of the third quarter of 2002, and the consolidated company will operate under the Bank of the West name. BancWest, which is also the parent company of First Hawaiian Bank, expects to close December 20, 2001 a transaction that will make it a wholly owned subsidiary of BNP Paribas, a world leader in banking and financial services. BNP Paribas, a 45% owner of BancWest, is in the process of acquiring the remaining 55% of BancWest stock. BNP Paribas, headquartered in Paris, is the Number 1-listed bank in France, Number 2-listed bank in the Euro zone and among the 10 largest banks in the world, based on asset size. United California Bank is the product of last July's merger of Sanwa Bank California and Tokai Bank of California. The parent company of United California Bank is UFJ Holdings, which was created in Japan last spring in the merger of The Sanwa Bank, Limited, The Tokai Bank, Limited and The Toyo Trust and Banking Company, Limited. BNP Paribas' financial advisor on the transaction is Lehman Brothers and its legal advisors are Cleary, Gottlieb, Steen & Hamilton and Pillsbury Winthrop. UFJ Holdings/United California Bank's financial advisor is Morgan Stanley and its legal advisor is Shearman & Sterling. About United California Bank United California Bank (www.unitedcalbank.com), with approximately $11 billion in assets, provides a full range of personal, business, international and trust services through a network of 117 branches statewide. About BancWest BancWest Corporation (www.bancwestcorp.com) is a bank holding company with assets of $19.8 billion. It is headquartered in Honolulu, Hawaii, with an administrative headquarters in San Francisco, California. Its principal subsidiaries are Bank of the West (193 branches in Northern and Central California, Oregon, New Mexico, Nevada, Washington state and Idaho) and First Hawaiian Bank (56 branches in Hawaii, two in Guam and one in Saipan). About BNP Paribas BNP Paribas (www.bnpparibas.com) is a world leader in banking and financial services, offering retail banking and financial services (consumer credit, leasing, e-brokerage, insurance, car fleet management, etc.) to millions of individual customers and corporations mainly in France (2000 branches), Europe, the United States, Mediterranean basin and Africa. Headquartered in Paris, France, it has one of the most extensive international networks in the world with offices in 87 countries. Active in all major financial centers, and providing services to large corporations and institutions, BNP Paribas enjoys key positions in Corporate and Investment Banking, Private Banking, Asset Management and Securities Services. With total assets of $646 billion (EUR 694 billion), shareholders equity of $19.3 billion (EUR 20.6 billion), and Year 2000 net income of $3.86 billion (EUR 4.12 billion), BNP Paribas was the Number 1-listed bank in France and Number 2-listed bank in the Euro zone at the close of 2000. ########################## ####################################### ---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Association for Government Leasing & Finance http://www.aglf.org/publications.html to receive a copy in Adobe Acrobat Reader form of the November 2001 Edition of T.E.L.L. Co-Founder of Kelley Blue Book Dies NORCO, Calif. (AP) - Sidney H. ``Buster'' Kelley, a used car dealer who helped develop the Kelley Blue Book car-pricing Bible of automobile values, has died. He was 92. Kelley, who lived in Huntington Beach, died of cancer Wednesday at the home of daughter Deborah Sanchez. Kelley was among the first auto dealers a half-century ago to use television commercials to sell cars from his Kelley Kar Co. in Los Angeles. He also pioneered the five-year auto loan and he offered car insurance and extended warranties. The Kelley Blue Book of Motor Car Values, the key reference for the automotive industry in assessing the value of new and used cars, was first published in 1926 by Kelley's older brother Leslie. It contained prices and cash values for thousands of vehicles. But Leslie became tired of the car dealership and the Blue Book business, gradually turning over operations in the 1930s to younger brother Buster. Leslie died in 1990. Buster and son Robert Kelley remained co-publishers of the Kelley Blue Book until about two years ago. Kelley is survived by his son, his daughter, eight grandchildren and 10 great-grandchildren. A funeral will be held today at Forest Lawn Memorial Park in Cypress. _________________________________________________________________________ #### CalFirst Bancorp Announces Second Quarter Dividend SANTA ANA, Calif--The board of directors of California First National Bancorp (Nasdaq:CFNB) today declared a quarterly cash dividend in the amount of 4 cents ($0.04) per share. The dividend will be payable on Jan. 4, 2002 to all stockholders of record at the close of business on Dec. 21, 2001. California First National Bancorp is a diversified financial services company with two primary businesses -- leasing of high technology capital assets to business and organizations nationwide, and banking through a FDIC-insured national bank. CONTACT: ########### #################################################### TIPS TO CUT TAXES San Francisco
Chronicle -- -- Charity: If you are planning to make a tax- deductible contribution, do it before the end of the year. Consider donating stock on which you have an unrealized capital gain. You can deduct the full value and won't have to pay the capital-gains tax. -- Home mortgage: Make your January payment in December so you can deduct the extra interest from your taxes for 2001. -- Property taxes: Pay the amount due in April before this year ends. -- State taxes: If you owe estimated payments on your state income tax, make the payment normally due on Jan. 15 no later than Dec. 31. State taxes are deductible on your federal tax form. -- Medical expenses: If the amount of your unreimbursed medical expenses this year is near or above 7.5 percent of your income, schedule your next appointments with the doctor or dentist before the end of the year. The amount by which the expenses exceed 7.5 percent of adjusted gross income is tax- deductible. Homeowner experiment faces test under dragging economy By Steven Syre & Charles Stein, Boston Globe Staff, Over the past decade the United States conducted a great experiment in social policy. The goal was to boost the number of American homeowners. The method involved changing the rules of the game. By relaxing traditional standards - on the size of the down payment and the income and credit history of the borrower - the government and a determined group of activists hoped to make homeowners of people who historically had been left out in the cold. The results speak for themselves. The ranks of homeowners grew by 8 million between 1994 and 2000. A record 67.8 percent of American households now own their own homes. And many of the newcomers to the housing market are immigrants, Hispanics, and blacks, the very people the experiment was designed to help. There is only one problem. The experiment was conducted under ideal laboratory conditions. The economy in the 1990s was terrific, jobs were plentiful, and home prices rose. ''Prosperity covers up a lot of mistakes,'' said Nicholas Retsinas, director of the Joint Center for Housing Studies at Harvard University. Now that prosperity has given way to recession, the home owning experiment will be tested under harsher real world conditions. On Friday the government reported that the nation's jobless rate in November reached 5.7 percent, the highest level in six years. Karl Case isn't sure how things will turn out, but said, ''What I've seen so far makes me very nervous.'' Case is an economics professor at Wellesley College and a real estate specialist. He spoke right after the Mortgage Bankers Association last week released numbers that showed a rise in mortgage delinquencies. In the third quarter, 4.87 percent of American mortgage holders were at least 30 days late on their payments, the highest level of delinquencies since the fourth quarter of 1991. On the face of it, the numbers aren't that worrisome. More homeowners were behind on their payments during much of the 1980s. But Case and others say the recent rise in delinquencies doesn't reflect the economic downturn. They say that loan problems are a lagging indicator, which means the true impact of the recession on the numbers may not be visible for another six months to a year. Still there are already hints of trouble to come. In two government loan programs for lower-income borrowers, one run by the Federal Housing Administration, the other by the Veterans Administration, the delinquency rates in the third quarter were 11.36 percent and 8.11 percent, respectively. The delinquency rates were also high in a category of mortgages known as subprime, high-interest loans made to borrowers with poor credit histories. ''The problems are more pronounced in the more risky category of mortgages,'' said Mark Zandi, chief economist at Economy.com, a Pennsylvania forecasting firm. The expansion
of housing in the 1990s was based on the notion that making mortgage
loans was not as risky as we thought it was. Activists across the country
complained that the rules of the housing game were too restrictive and
unfair to minorities. Prodded by the activists in cities like Boston,
and later by the Clinton administration, the mortgage industry loosened
up and made loans to people who in previous times would have been denied
credit. ''We lack the cushion we once had,'' he said. And then there is subprime lending. In the early 1990s it barely existed in the mortgage market. Last year subprime lenders made $160 billion worth of home loans, a blend of new mortgages and refinancing. The loans, which are heavily concentrated in minority neighborhoods, typically carry double-digit interest rates to compensate for the higher risk. As of September, 7.1 percent of subprime mortgages were at least three months in arrears, up from 5.5 percent at the beginning of the year, according to LoanPerformance, a San Francisco research firm. No one is pushing the panic button yet. In fact, economists and those who study the mortgage market say there are forces at work that could minimize the problem. For one thing, home prices are still rising. In that kind of environment, buyers behind in their payments could always sell their homes and walk away with some equity. Lenders in a world of strong home prices are apt to be more patient with delinquent borrowers because they know their loans are safe. So far, at least, foreclosures are still few and far between. Another plus: The economy, while weak, is not in the danger zone. November's 5.7 percent jobless rate is well below the 7.8 percent peak that was reached during the recession in the early 1990s. But this recession isn't over. The jobless rate will almost certainly rise in the months to come. If the recovery proves to be a weak one, the jobless rate could rise for most of the next year. Should that happen, the combination of a high unemployment rate and lots of stretched borrowers could prove lethal to the housing market. The housing experiment is a work in progress. Let's hope it is still working and there is progress to report a year from now. Steven
Syre (617-929-2918) and Charles Stein (617-929-2922) can be reached
by e-mail at boscap@globe.com.
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