Sacramento, CA (PRWEB) February 28, 2012
In the current economic downturn, consumers know they can turn to trusted ReallyBadCreditOffers.com for bad credit loans and no hassle financial help, but now the beloved family pet has a financial ally as well. The site has announced a new suite of installment loan offers for pet owners in need of money for emergency vet bills to ensure the family pet receives the medical attention it needs.
According to the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics, 77% of veterinarians in private practice service the medical needs of pet owners, predominantly dogs and cats. Medical expenses for treating pets have been rising and families face the tough decisions if they do not have the money required to meet the costs of care for their beloved animals.
People with bad credit ratings facing financial hardship in these tough times do not have access to the traditional resources good credit scores make available. The new personal loans being offered allow families access to money with a 60 second application process and no credit check required. In so doing the site hopes to lend a helping hand in an area traditional lenders do not consider an emergency.
“I own a cat and a dog, they are valued members of my family, and have helped me through some very tough times, we just would like to acknowledge how important our pets are to us in challenging times and ensure no family pet is denied the care they deserve because of money trouble,” said Ariel Pryor, founder.
The popular consumer site offers a variety of resources to help families improve their personal finances, eliminate debt and fix and reenter the financial system after bankruptcy, foreclosure and bad credit. Visitors to the site can see a variety of bad credit loans with no hidden fees to compare the offers and choose the best of the recommended services.
Contact:
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2012年2月13日星期一
Interest rates for common student loan could double this summer
Break’s over.
For the last five years, Congress has cut students a break on the interest rate for unsubsidized student loans, the most popular kind used at Ball State. Starting in July, if the low rate of 3.4 percent isn’t reinstated, it could go back to 6.8 percent, which represents an average $2,000 increase over the course of paying back the loan.
In 2007, the College Cost Reduction and Access Act was passed, which reduced the rate to 3.4 percent for undergraduate students. It was meant to help make college more affordable during poor economic times. Now the plan is about to expire.
“They only had a five-year plan,” said John McPherson, director of Ball State’s Scholarships and Financial Aid. “And now the only way to keep the cost low is to come up with more money to pay for it.”
Rep. Joe Courtney (R-Calif.) recently introduced a bill to keep the rate at 3.4 percent, and President Barack Obama has said he wants to keep it for at least a year.
“A college education is key to success in today’s economy,” said Courtney in a press release on his website. “But for many students, the spiraling costs of higher education are creating an immense barrier.”
For the average student using a subsidized Stafford Loan, it could means about a $2,000 increase over 10 years, according to information from the National Association of Student Financial Aid Administrators.
“If you look at averages, obviously a college degree provides opportunities you can never get anywhere else,” McPherson said. “Over the life of a person, it’s not going to be huge.”
Sophomore Joseph Dimaggio uses loans and grants to pay for college, and since he decided to add a second major, he anticipates being in college an extra two and a half years. He said he’s afraid that he’ll have to spend several years paying back his loans before he can start to settle down.
“There are a lot of things I’d rather do with $2,000,” he said.
He said he wants to become an actuarial scientist, and he said it’s important to know what jobs are in demand.
“We hit such a low,” he said. “And I have a lot of friends that are older and overqualified for the job they have, especially in teaching.”
Last academic year, about 10,400 Ball State students used subsidized Stafford loans. Altogether, they borrowed $44 million.
Even if the interest rate is brought back to 6.8 percent, McPherson said this is the best deal for most students, especially if this is their first time taking out a loan. Private lenders might deny them, or give them a higher interest rate, McPherson said.
Perkins loans have a fixed 5 percent interest. But they are for extremely needy students, and not many people qualify, he said.
With a subsidized loan, the federal government absorbs the interest while a student is in college and six months afterward. If the CCRAA program is abolished, students would be responsible for the interest accumulated during the six months after they graduate.
With unsubsidized loans, students pay the interest that is built up during college and during the six-month grace period after graduation. The government uses a formula to determine a student’s need and how much money they will receive with each type of loan. The formula includes factors like income, family size, number of people already in college and the family’s assets.
Every year, two thirds of Ball State students borrow some kind of loan, McPherson said. In 2010-2011, undergrads were leaving college with an average debt of $24,121.
Rob Tyler, an adjunct professor of personal finance and the founder of Tyler Wealth Management, offered examples of how this would impact students. His estimate: not very much.
To repay the average student loan over 10 years with an interest rate of 3.4 percent, the monthly payment is about $237.59. At a rate of 6.8 percent, the monthly payment jumps to $277.79, an increase of just $40.20.
Tyler crunched a few numbers based on loan information from the Ball State Credit Union.
The interest rate for a loan from the credit union on a new car, for example, is 2.99 percent. In order to offset the extra $40.20 a student is paying back on student loans, and with the interest rate for a new car taken into consideration, they would need to buy a car that costs $2,237 less than what they had previously budgeted.
On a loan for a new house, Tyler used a 4.5 percent fixed interest rate on a 30-year mortgage for his example. In that case, to accommodate the extra $40.20 a month in student loans, he or she would want to buy a house that’s about $8,000 less than they budgeted — not a huge amount relative to a $200,000 home.
“You have to think, what’s my sacrifice?” Tyler said. “Your college education is going to last you a lifetime.”
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For the last five years, Congress has cut students a break on the interest rate for unsubsidized student loans, the most popular kind used at Ball State. Starting in July, if the low rate of 3.4 percent isn’t reinstated, it could go back to 6.8 percent, which represents an average $2,000 increase over the course of paying back the loan.
In 2007, the College Cost Reduction and Access Act was passed, which reduced the rate to 3.4 percent for undergraduate students. It was meant to help make college more affordable during poor economic times. Now the plan is about to expire.
“They only had a five-year plan,” said John McPherson, director of Ball State’s Scholarships and Financial Aid. “And now the only way to keep the cost low is to come up with more money to pay for it.”
Rep. Joe Courtney (R-Calif.) recently introduced a bill to keep the rate at 3.4 percent, and President Barack Obama has said he wants to keep it for at least a year.
“A college education is key to success in today’s economy,” said Courtney in a press release on his website. “But for many students, the spiraling costs of higher education are creating an immense barrier.”
For the average student using a subsidized Stafford Loan, it could means about a $2,000 increase over 10 years, according to information from the National Association of Student Financial Aid Administrators.
“If you look at averages, obviously a college degree provides opportunities you can never get anywhere else,” McPherson said. “Over the life of a person, it’s not going to be huge.”
Sophomore Joseph Dimaggio uses loans and grants to pay for college, and since he decided to add a second major, he anticipates being in college an extra two and a half years. He said he’s afraid that he’ll have to spend several years paying back his loans before he can start to settle down.
“There are a lot of things I’d rather do with $2,000,” he said.
He said he wants to become an actuarial scientist, and he said it’s important to know what jobs are in demand.
“We hit such a low,” he said. “And I have a lot of friends that are older and overqualified for the job they have, especially in teaching.”
Last academic year, about 10,400 Ball State students used subsidized Stafford loans. Altogether, they borrowed $44 million.
Even if the interest rate is brought back to 6.8 percent, McPherson said this is the best deal for most students, especially if this is their first time taking out a loan. Private lenders might deny them, or give them a higher interest rate, McPherson said.
Perkins loans have a fixed 5 percent interest. But they are for extremely needy students, and not many people qualify, he said.
With a subsidized loan, the federal government absorbs the interest while a student is in college and six months afterward. If the CCRAA program is abolished, students would be responsible for the interest accumulated during the six months after they graduate.
With unsubsidized loans, students pay the interest that is built up during college and during the six-month grace period after graduation. The government uses a formula to determine a student’s need and how much money they will receive with each type of loan. The formula includes factors like income, family size, number of people already in college and the family’s assets.
Every year, two thirds of Ball State students borrow some kind of loan, McPherson said. In 2010-2011, undergrads were leaving college with an average debt of $24,121.
Rob Tyler, an adjunct professor of personal finance and the founder of Tyler Wealth Management, offered examples of how this would impact students. His estimate: not very much.
To repay the average student loan over 10 years with an interest rate of 3.4 percent, the monthly payment is about $237.59. At a rate of 6.8 percent, the monthly payment jumps to $277.79, an increase of just $40.20.
Tyler crunched a few numbers based on loan information from the Ball State Credit Union.
The interest rate for a loan from the credit union on a new car, for example, is 2.99 percent. In order to offset the extra $40.20 a student is paying back on student loans, and with the interest rate for a new car taken into consideration, they would need to buy a car that costs $2,237 less than what they had previously budgeted.
On a loan for a new house, Tyler used a 4.5 percent fixed interest rate on a 30-year mortgage for his example. In that case, to accommodate the extra $40.20 a month in student loans, he or she would want to buy a house that’s about $8,000 less than they budgeted — not a huge amount relative to a $200,000 home.
“You have to think, what’s my sacrifice?” Tyler said. “Your college education is going to last you a lifetime.”
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2012年2月6日星期一
CFS Bancorp, Inc. Reports Fourth Quarter and 2011 Financial Results
MUNSTER, IN–(Marketwire -02/06/12)- CFS Bancorp, Inc. (the Company), (NASDAQ: CITZ – News), the parent of Citizens Financial Bank (the Bank), today reported a net loss of $(12.6) million, or $(1.17) per share, for the fourth quarter of 2011, compared to net income of $918,000, or $.09 per diluted share, for the fourth quarter of 2010. The Company‘s unaudited net loss for the year ended December 31, 2011 was $(10.5) million, or $(.98) per share, compared to net income of $3.5 million, or $.32 per diluted share for 2010. The loss for the fourth quarter and year ended December 31, 2011 was primarily related to a $12.5 million provision for loan losses, a non-cash charge of $6.3 million related to a valuation allowance the Company recorded for a portion of its deferred tax assets, and the $1.4 million retirement compensation expense as a result of the retirement of the former Chairman and Chief Executive Officer in December 2011.
Financial results for the quarter also include:
“Our fourth quarter was challenging, but we made good progress in addressing asset quality issues, and our highest priority remains reducing non-performing assets,” said Daryl D. Pomranke, Chief Executive Officer. “The receipt of updated appraisals, which reflect the continued decrease in property values as a result of the current economic conditions, as well as additional information we obtained about the borrowers, the guarantors, or the operations of the property securing the loan, negatively impacted our analysis of specific loans reviewed for impairment in the current quarter. We believe, however, that we will be able to restructure some of these loans based upon their current, albeit lower, cash flow streams, and with demonstrated compliance with the modified terms over time, be able to return these loans to performing status. We expect further improvement in our credit quality indicators as we progress through 2012.”
“We continue to examine our cost structure and look for opportunities to work more effectively and efficiently. As a result of our ongoing review, a decision was made to close our Bolingbrook and Orland Park, Illinois offices as of March 31, 2012. This decision was based on our analysis that showed a low probability of achieving the targeted goals we believed were necessary to justify their continued operation,” added Pomranke. “In addition, our Voluntary Early Retirement Offering, implemented during the first quarter of 2012, will result in the Company incurring additional early retirement expenses in the first quarter of 2012, but allow us to achieve further staffing efficiencies and cost reductions in the long term.”
“We continue to have consistently good core deposit growth as a result of the partnership between our Retail and Business Banking teams and expect continued growth with a new checking deposit acquisition marketing program targeting both retail and business clients starting in the first quarter,” continued Pomranke. “Business loan originations in 2011 exceeded the 2010 levels, and we believe, based on early indications, that 2012 will meet or exceed 2011 levels.”
Progress on Strategic Growth and Diversification Plan
The Company continues to focus its efforts on reducing the level of non-performing loans, seeking to either restructure specific non-performing credits or foreclose, obtain title, and transfer the loan to other real estate owned where we can take control of and liquidate the underlying collateral. The Company’s ratio of non-performing loans to total loans decreased to 6.41% at December 31, 2011 from 8.18% at September 30, 2011 and 7.44% at December 31, 2010, primarily as a result of decreases in non-accruing non-owner occupied commercial real estate, commercial construction and development, and commercial participation loans and an increase in charge-offs and transfers to other real estate owned during the quarter. The ratio of non-performing assets to total assets declined to 5.63% at December 31, 2011 from 6.55% at September 30, 2011 and 6.85% at December 31, 2010, primarily due to the aforementioned reduction in non-accruing loans and the impact of a larger balance sheet from December 31, 2010. See the Asset Quality table in this press release for more detailed information.
Non-interest expense for the fourth quarter of 2011 increased to $10.9 million from $9.2 million for the third quarter of 2011 and from $9.3 million for the fourth quarter of 2010. The increase was primarily related to the retirement compensation expense of $1.4 million in connection with the retirement of the former Chairman of the Board and Chief Executive Officer, Thomas F. Prisby. Excluding the retirement compensation expense, non-interest expense for the fourth quarter was stable at $9.5 million compared to $9.2 million for the third quarter of 2011 and $9.3 million for the fourth quarter of 2010.
The Company remains focused on reducing non-interest expense. The implementation in 2011 of a hiring freeze and realignment of the retail banking center structure into three regions down from four has had a positive impact. The number of full-time equivalent (FTE) employees at December 31, 2011 was 303, down from 311 at September 30, 2011 and 322 at December 31, 2010. Additional FTE reductions are expected due to the planned outsourcing of certain activities currently performed internally as well as the other planned expense reduction initiatives noted above including the branch closings and Voluntary Early Retirement Offering. In late December 2011, the Bank filed the required notice with its primary regulator that it intends to close its Bolingbrook and Orland Park branches effective March 31, 2012 and transfer those client relationships to the Darien and Tinley Park banking centers, respectively.
The Company continues to target specific segments in its loan portfolio for growth, including commercial and industrial, owner occupied commercial real estate, and multifamily, which in the aggregate comprised 53.0% of the commercial loan portfolio at December 31, 2011, compared to 52.2% at September 30, 2011 and 50.7% at December 31, 2010. The Company’s focus on deepening relationships with clients continues to emphasize core deposit growth. Total core deposits as a percentage of total deposits increased to 61.1% at December 31, 2011 from 60.5% at September 30, 2011 and 57.0% at December 31, 2010. The Bank implemented a new High Performance Checking (HPC) deposit acquisition marketing program during the first quarter of 2012 to further enhance its growth in core deposits and related fee income as well as to provide additional cross-selling opportunities.
Pre-tax, Pre-Provision Earnings, As Adjusted(1)
The Company’s pre-tax, pre-provision earnings, as adjusted, increased to $2.8 million for the fourth quarter of 2011 from $2.7 million for the third quarter of 2011 and $2.2 million for the fourth quarter of 2010. The pre-tax, pre-provision earnings, as adjusted, for the fourth quarter of 2011 compared to the third quarter of 2011 was favorably impacted by increased gains on the sale of loans receivable combined with a decrease in compensation and employee benefits expense, primarily due to the reversal of incentive compensation expense accruals and the FTE employee reductions.
1 A schedule reconciling earnings in accordance with U.S. generally accepted accounting principles (GAAP) to the non-GAAP measurement of pre-tax, pre-provision earnings, as adjusted, is provided on the last page of the attached tables.
Net Interest Income and Net Interest Margin
Interest income totaled $10.7 million for the fourth quarter of 2011 and was stable compared to $10.7 million for the third quarter of 2011 and decreased 5.7% from $11.4 million for the fourth quarter of 2010. The fluctuations are primarily related to the Bank reinvesting its proceeds from sales and maturities of investment securities in lower yielding investments and maintaining higher levels of short-term liquid investments due to the lack of suitable higher yielding investment alternatives in the current low interest rate environment and modest loan demand.
Interest expense decreased 6.8% to $1.8 million for the fourth quarter of 2011 compared to $1.9 million for the third quarter of 2011 and 27.9% from $2.5 million for the fourth quarter of 2010. The Bank’s success in growing low cost core deposits and continued disciplined pricing on new and renewing certificates of deposit at lower interest rates contributed to the decrease in interest expense during the fourth quarter of 2011 compared to the third quarter of 2011 and the fourth quarter of 2010.
Non-Interest Income and Non-Interest Expense
Non-interest income decreased $776,000, or 23.4%, to $2.5 million for the fourth quarter of 2011 compared to the third quarter of 2011 primarily due to decreases of $493,000 in net gains on sales of investment securities, $203,000 in net gains on sales of other real estate owned, and $109,000 in service charges and other fees, partially offset by an increase in gain on the sale of mortgage loans of $122,000. Excluding the gains on sales of investment securities and other real estate owned, non-interest income was relatively stable compared to the third quarter of 2011.
Non-interest income increased $209,000, or 9.0%, from $2.3 million for the fourth quarter of 2010 primarily due to recording a gain on the sale of other real estate owned of $63,000 in the current quarter compared to the loss of $168,000 recorded in the fourth quarter of 2010.
Non-interest expense for the fourth quarter of 2011 increased 18.6% and 17.4%, respectively, to $10.9 million compared to $9.2 million for the third quarter of 2011 and $9.3 million for the fourth quarter of 2010. The increase during the fourth quarter of 2011 was primarily due to the retirement compensation expense of $1.4 million incurred as a result of the retirement of the Company’s former Chairman of the Board and Chief Executive Officer. Excluding this expense, non-interest expense for the fourth quarter would have totaled $9.5 million, which represents a 3.6% increase from the third quarter of 2011 and a 2.6% increase from the fourth quarter of 2010.
Compensation and employee benefits for the fourth quarter of 2011 decreased $499,000 from the third quarter of 2011 and $458,000 from the fourth quarter of 2010 primarily due to the reversal of accrued incentive compensation expense as a result of the net loss for the quarter coupled with a decrease in overall compensation expense due to a lower number of FTE employees. Net other real estate owned related expense increased during the fourth quarter, primarily due to $724,000 of additional valuation allowances recognized on certain other real estate owned properties. This increase resulted from updated appraisals received during the fourth quarter as well as a reduction in the sales price of a land development project acquired in the foreclosure of a commercial participation loan. Other non-interest expense in the fourth quarter of 2011 included the write-off of $305,000 of construction-in-progress costs related to future branch sites that were transferred in accordance with regulatory rules to other real estate owned during the first quarter of 2011 as the Bank has decided to not utilize the parcels for their original planned use. The former future branch land parcels in Olympia Fields and Bolingbrook, along with the current Bolingbrook office, are currently listed for sale with no additional loss expected.
Income Tax Expense
During the current quarter, the Company’s income tax expense totaled $638,000, which included a $6.3 million valuation allowance related to a portion of its deferred tax assets. Based on the results of its regular assessment of the ability to realize its deferred tax assets, the Company concluded that, based on all available evidence, both positive and negative, approximately $6.3 million of its deferred tax assets did not meet the “more likely than not” threshold for realization as of December 31, 2011. Although realization of the remaining net deferred tax assets of $16.3 million is not assured, management believes it is more likely than not that all of the recorded deferred tax assets will be realized. The amount of the deferred tax asset considered realizable, however, could be reduced in the near term if estimates of future taxable income during tax loss carryforward periods are reduced.
Asset Quality
The provision for loan losses increased to $12.5 million for the fourth quarter of 2011 compared to $2.7 million for the third quarter of 2011 and $825,000 for the fourth quarter of 2010. The increase during the fourth quarter of 2011 was primarily related to higher levels of loan charge-offs and the related impact on the historical loss experience factors utilized in the allowance for loan losses methodology.
The ratio of the allowance for loan losses to total loans decreased to 1.75% at December 31, 2011 compared to 2.37% and 2.34%, respectively, at September 30, 2011 and December 31, 2010, primarily due to the charge-off of $7.9 million of previously established specific reserves during the quarter as new information obtained for these non-performing loans indicated they should be considered collateral dependent loans. When it is determined that a non-performing collateral-dependent loan has a collateral shortfall, management immediately charges-off the collateral shortfall. As a result, the Company is not required to maintain an allowance for loan losses on these loans as the loan balance has already been written down to its net realizable value (fair value less estimated costs to sell the collateral). As such, the ratio of the allowance for loan losses to total loans and the ratio of the allowance for loan losses to non-performing loans have been negatively affected by cumulative partial charge-offs of $15.1 million recorded through December 31, 2011 on $18.2 million (net of charge-offs) on non-performing collateral dependent loans.
During the fourth quarter, the Bank sold $560,000 of other real estate owned, recognizing pre-tax net gains on the sales of $63,000. The Bank currently has contracts on five separate other real estate owned properties which should reduce non-performing assets by an additional $1.3 million during the first quarter of 2012 with no anticipated loss on sale, presuming the transactions close as scheduled and pursuant to the contractual terms.
Balance Sheet and Capital
Through the execution of our Strategic Growth and Diversification Plan and our focus on lending to small- to medium-sized businesses, we continue to diversify our loan portfolio and reduce loans not meeting our current defined risk tolerance. The Company’s targeted growth segments within the loan portfolio, including commercial and industrial, commercial real estate – owner occupied, and multifamily commercial real estate, increased to 53.0% of the commercial loan portfolio at December 31, 2011 compared to 50.7% at December 31, 2010. Commercial participations decreased $4.7 million, or 28.0%, to $12.1 million compared to $16.7 million at September 30, 2011 and $11.5 million, or 48.9%, compared to $23.6 million at December 31, 2010. The decrease in participation loans is primarily due to charge-offs and transfers to other real estate owned during the quarter and year to date period.
During the fourth quarter of 2011, the Bank sold $10.3 million of conforming one-to-four family fixed-rate mortgage loans to Fannie Mae and recorded a gain on sale of $188,000.
Deposits
Borrowed Funds
Shareholders’ Equity
Shareholders’ equity at December 31, 2011 decreased $11.5 million to $103.2 million from $114.8 million at September 30, 2011, and decreased $9.7 million from $112.9 million at December 31, 2010. The decrease in shareholders’ equity during the fourth quarter of 2011 was primarily related to the net loss for the quarter, partially offset by the $1.2 million decrease in accumulated other comprehensive loss.
At December 31, 2011, the Company’s tangible common equity was $103.2 million, or 8.99% of assets, compared to $112.9 million, or 10.07% of assets at December 31, 2010. At December 31, 2011, the Bank’s core and risk-based capital ratios exceeded “minimum” and “well capitalized” regulatory capital requirements.
Company Profile
CFS Bancorp, Inc. is the parent of Citizens Financial Bank, a $1.1 billion asset federal savings bank. Citizens Financial Bank is an independent bank focusing its people, products, and services on helping individuals, businesses, and communities to be successful. The Bank has 22 full-service banking centers throughout adjoining markets in Chicago’s Southwest suburbs and Northwest Indiana. The Company’s website can be found at www.citz.com.
Forward-Looking Information
This press release contains certain forward-looking statements and information relating to the Company that is based on the beliefs of management as well as assumptions made by and information currently available to management. These forward-looking statements include but are not limited to statements regarding our ability to successfully execute our strategy and our Strategic Growth and Diversification Plan, the level and sufficiency of our current regulatory capital and equity ratios, our ability to continue to diversify the loan portfolio, our efforts at deepening client relationships, increasing our levels of core deposits, lowering our non-performing asset levels, managing and reducing our credit-related costs, increasing our revenue growth and levels of earning assets, the effects of general economic and competitive conditions nationally and within our core market area, our ability to sell other real estate owned properties, levels of provision for and the allowance for loan losses, amounts of charge-offs, levels of loan and deposit growth, interest on loans, asset yields and cost of funds, net interest income, net interest margin, non-interest income, non-interest expense, the interest rate environment, and other risk factors identified in the Company’s filings it makes with the Securities and Exchange Commission. In addition, the words “anticipate,” “believe,” “estimate,” “expect,” “indicate,” “intend,” “should,” and similar expressions, or the negative thereof, as well as statements that include future events, tense, or dates, or that are not historical or current facts, as they relate to the Company or the Company’s management, are intended to identify forward-looking statements. Such statements reflect the current views of the Company with respect to future events and are subject to certain risks, uncertainties, assumptions, and changes in circumstances. Forward-looking statements are not guarantees of future performance or outcomes, and actual results or events may differ materially from those included in these statements. The Company does not intend to update these forward-looking statements unless required to under the federal securities laws.
SELECTED CONSOLIDATED FINANCIALS AND OTHER DATA FOLLOW
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Financial results for the quarter also include:
- Non-performing assets decreased to $64.7 million compared to $76.5 million at September 30, 2011 primarily due to loan charge-offs;
- Non-performing loans to total loans decreased to 6.41% from 8.18% at September 30, 2011 and 7.44% at December 31, 2010;
- Gross charge-offs for the fourth quarter of 2011 totaled $17.4 million, of which $7.9 million had been previously reserved;
- Core deposits increased to $597.4 million, which is 61.1% of total deposits, compared to $596.8 million, or 60.5% of total deposits, at September 30, 2011 and $539.3 million, or 57.0% of total deposits, at December 31, 2010;
- Net interest margin was 3.38% in the fourth quarter of 2011 compared to 3.39% in the third quarter of 2011 and 3.49% in the fourth quarter of 2010; and
- The Bank’s risk-based capital ratio decreased to 12.65% from 13.57% at September 30, 2011 and 13.32% at December 31, 2010.
“Our fourth quarter was challenging, but we made good progress in addressing asset quality issues, and our highest priority remains reducing non-performing assets,” said Daryl D. Pomranke, Chief Executive Officer. “The receipt of updated appraisals, which reflect the continued decrease in property values as a result of the current economic conditions, as well as additional information we obtained about the borrowers, the guarantors, or the operations of the property securing the loan, negatively impacted our analysis of specific loans reviewed for impairment in the current quarter. We believe, however, that we will be able to restructure some of these loans based upon their current, albeit lower, cash flow streams, and with demonstrated compliance with the modified terms over time, be able to return these loans to performing status. We expect further improvement in our credit quality indicators as we progress through 2012.”
“We continue to examine our cost structure and look for opportunities to work more effectively and efficiently. As a result of our ongoing review, a decision was made to close our Bolingbrook and Orland Park, Illinois offices as of March 31, 2012. This decision was based on our analysis that showed a low probability of achieving the targeted goals we believed were necessary to justify their continued operation,” added Pomranke. “In addition, our Voluntary Early Retirement Offering, implemented during the first quarter of 2012, will result in the Company incurring additional early retirement expenses in the first quarter of 2012, but allow us to achieve further staffing efficiencies and cost reductions in the long term.”
“We continue to have consistently good core deposit growth as a result of the partnership between our Retail and Business Banking teams and expect continued growth with a new checking deposit acquisition marketing program targeting both retail and business clients starting in the first quarter,” continued Pomranke. “Business loan originations in 2011 exceeded the 2010 levels, and we believe, based on early indications, that 2012 will meet or exceed 2011 levels.”
Progress on Strategic Growth and Diversification Plan
The Company continues to focus its efforts on reducing the level of non-performing loans, seeking to either restructure specific non-performing credits or foreclose, obtain title, and transfer the loan to other real estate owned where we can take control of and liquidate the underlying collateral. The Company’s ratio of non-performing loans to total loans decreased to 6.41% at December 31, 2011 from 8.18% at September 30, 2011 and 7.44% at December 31, 2010, primarily as a result of decreases in non-accruing non-owner occupied commercial real estate, commercial construction and development, and commercial participation loans and an increase in charge-offs and transfers to other real estate owned during the quarter. The ratio of non-performing assets to total assets declined to 5.63% at December 31, 2011 from 6.55% at September 30, 2011 and 6.85% at December 31, 2010, primarily due to the aforementioned reduction in non-accruing loans and the impact of a larger balance sheet from December 31, 2010. See the Asset Quality table in this press release for more detailed information.
Non-interest expense for the fourth quarter of 2011 increased to $10.9 million from $9.2 million for the third quarter of 2011 and from $9.3 million for the fourth quarter of 2010. The increase was primarily related to the retirement compensation expense of $1.4 million in connection with the retirement of the former Chairman of the Board and Chief Executive Officer, Thomas F. Prisby. Excluding the retirement compensation expense, non-interest expense for the fourth quarter was stable at $9.5 million compared to $9.2 million for the third quarter of 2011 and $9.3 million for the fourth quarter of 2010.
The Company remains focused on reducing non-interest expense. The implementation in 2011 of a hiring freeze and realignment of the retail banking center structure into three regions down from four has had a positive impact. The number of full-time equivalent (FTE) employees at December 31, 2011 was 303, down from 311 at September 30, 2011 and 322 at December 31, 2010. Additional FTE reductions are expected due to the planned outsourcing of certain activities currently performed internally as well as the other planned expense reduction initiatives noted above including the branch closings and Voluntary Early Retirement Offering. In late December 2011, the Bank filed the required notice with its primary regulator that it intends to close its Bolingbrook and Orland Park branches effective March 31, 2012 and transfer those client relationships to the Darien and Tinley Park banking centers, respectively.
The Company continues to target specific segments in its loan portfolio for growth, including commercial and industrial, owner occupied commercial real estate, and multifamily, which in the aggregate comprised 53.0% of the commercial loan portfolio at December 31, 2011, compared to 52.2% at September 30, 2011 and 50.7% at December 31, 2010. The Company’s focus on deepening relationships with clients continues to emphasize core deposit growth. Total core deposits as a percentage of total deposits increased to 61.1% at December 31, 2011 from 60.5% at September 30, 2011 and 57.0% at December 31, 2010. The Bank implemented a new High Performance Checking (HPC) deposit acquisition marketing program during the first quarter of 2012 to further enhance its growth in core deposits and related fee income as well as to provide additional cross-selling opportunities.
Pre-tax, Pre-Provision Earnings, As Adjusted(1)
The Company’s pre-tax, pre-provision earnings, as adjusted, increased to $2.8 million for the fourth quarter of 2011 from $2.7 million for the third quarter of 2011 and $2.2 million for the fourth quarter of 2010. The pre-tax, pre-provision earnings, as adjusted, for the fourth quarter of 2011 compared to the third quarter of 2011 was favorably impacted by increased gains on the sale of loans receivable combined with a decrease in compensation and employee benefits expense, primarily due to the reversal of incentive compensation expense accruals and the FTE employee reductions.
1 A schedule reconciling earnings in accordance with U.S. generally accepted accounting principles (GAAP) to the non-GAAP measurement of pre-tax, pre-provision earnings, as adjusted, is provided on the last page of the attached tables.
Net Interest Income and Net Interest Margin
Three Months Ended ----------------------------------------- December 31, September 30, December 31, 2011 2011 2010 ------------ ------------- ------------ (Dollars in thousands) Net interest margin 3.38% 3.39% 3.49% Interest rate spread 3.29 3.30 3.38 Net interest income $ 8,966 $ 8,849 $ 8,925 Average assets: Yield on interest-earning assets 4.04% 4.12% 4.45% Yield on loans receivable 4.72 4.82 5.00 Yield on investment securities 3.12 2.93 3.64 Average interest-earning assets $ 1,053,452 $ 1,036,064 $ 1,015,374 Average liabilities: Cost of interest-bearing liabilities .75% .82% 1.07% Cost of interest-bearing deposits .66 .73 .95 Cost of borrowed funds 2.10 2.28 2.63 Average interest-bearing liabilities $ 931,800 $ 922,049 $ 910,765The Company’s net interest margin was stable at 3.38% for the fourth quarter of 2011 compared to 3.39% for the third quarter of 2011 and decreased 11 basis points from 3.49% for the fourth quarter of 2010. Net interest income was $9.0 million for the fourth quarter of 2011 compared to $8.8 million for the third quarter of 2011 and the fourth quarter of 2010. The net interest margin continued to be negatively impacted by the Bank’s higher levels of liquidity due to strong core deposit growth, modest loan demand, and elevated level of non-performing assets. The increase in yields on investment securities during the fourth quarter of 2011 was related to purchases of securities with large discounts and the additional related accretion income as well as an increase in yields related to the Bank’s overall investment securities portfolio. In addition, the level of the Bank’s non-performing loans continues to negatively affect the yield on loans receivable. The Bank’s net interest margin was positively affected by a seven basis point decrease in the cost of interest-bearing liabilities from the third quarter of 2011 and a 32 basis point decrease compared to the fourth quarter of 2010.
Interest income totaled $10.7 million for the fourth quarter of 2011 and was stable compared to $10.7 million for the third quarter of 2011 and decreased 5.7% from $11.4 million for the fourth quarter of 2010. The fluctuations are primarily related to the Bank reinvesting its proceeds from sales and maturities of investment securities in lower yielding investments and maintaining higher levels of short-term liquid investments due to the lack of suitable higher yielding investment alternatives in the current low interest rate environment and modest loan demand.
Interest expense decreased 6.8% to $1.8 million for the fourth quarter of 2011 compared to $1.9 million for the third quarter of 2011 and 27.9% from $2.5 million for the fourth quarter of 2010. The Bank’s success in growing low cost core deposits and continued disciplined pricing on new and renewing certificates of deposit at lower interest rates contributed to the decrease in interest expense during the fourth quarter of 2011 compared to the third quarter of 2011 and the fourth quarter of 2010.
Non-Interest Income and Non-Interest Expense
Non-interest income decreased $776,000, or 23.4%, to $2.5 million for the fourth quarter of 2011 compared to the third quarter of 2011 primarily due to decreases of $493,000 in net gains on sales of investment securities, $203,000 in net gains on sales of other real estate owned, and $109,000 in service charges and other fees, partially offset by an increase in gain on the sale of mortgage loans of $122,000. Excluding the gains on sales of investment securities and other real estate owned, non-interest income was relatively stable compared to the third quarter of 2011.
Non-interest income increased $209,000, or 9.0%, from $2.3 million for the fourth quarter of 2010 primarily due to recording a gain on the sale of other real estate owned of $63,000 in the current quarter compared to the loss of $168,000 recorded in the fourth quarter of 2010.
Non-interest expense for the fourth quarter of 2011 increased 18.6% and 17.4%, respectively, to $10.9 million compared to $9.2 million for the third quarter of 2011 and $9.3 million for the fourth quarter of 2010. The increase during the fourth quarter of 2011 was primarily due to the retirement compensation expense of $1.4 million incurred as a result of the retirement of the Company’s former Chairman of the Board and Chief Executive Officer. Excluding this expense, non-interest expense for the fourth quarter would have totaled $9.5 million, which represents a 3.6% increase from the third quarter of 2011 and a 2.6% increase from the fourth quarter of 2010.
Compensation and employee benefits for the fourth quarter of 2011 decreased $499,000 from the third quarter of 2011 and $458,000 from the fourth quarter of 2010 primarily due to the reversal of accrued incentive compensation expense as a result of the net loss for the quarter coupled with a decrease in overall compensation expense due to a lower number of FTE employees. Net other real estate owned related expense increased during the fourth quarter, primarily due to $724,000 of additional valuation allowances recognized on certain other real estate owned properties. This increase resulted from updated appraisals received during the fourth quarter as well as a reduction in the sales price of a land development project acquired in the foreclosure of a commercial participation loan. Other non-interest expense in the fourth quarter of 2011 included the write-off of $305,000 of construction-in-progress costs related to future branch sites that were transferred in accordance with regulatory rules to other real estate owned during the first quarter of 2011 as the Bank has decided to not utilize the parcels for their original planned use. The former future branch land parcels in Olympia Fields and Bolingbrook, along with the current Bolingbrook office, are currently listed for sale with no additional loss expected.
Income Tax Expense
During the current quarter, the Company’s income tax expense totaled $638,000, which included a $6.3 million valuation allowance related to a portion of its deferred tax assets. Based on the results of its regular assessment of the ability to realize its deferred tax assets, the Company concluded that, based on all available evidence, both positive and negative, approximately $6.3 million of its deferred tax assets did not meet the “more likely than not” threshold for realization as of December 31, 2011. Although realization of the remaining net deferred tax assets of $16.3 million is not assured, management believes it is more likely than not that all of the recorded deferred tax assets will be realized. The amount of the deferred tax asset considered realizable, however, could be reduced in the near term if estimates of future taxable income during tax loss carryforward periods are reduced.
Asset Quality
December 31, September 30, December 31, 2011 2011 2010 -------------- --------------- ---------------- (Dollars in thousands) Non-performing loans (NPLs) $ 45,587 $ 59,335 $ 54,492 Other real estate owned 19,091 17,195 22,324 ------------- -------------- --------------- Non-performing assets (NPAs) $ 64,678 $ 76,530 $ 76,816 ============= ============== =============== Allowance for loan losses (ALL) $ 12,424 $ 17,186 $ 17,179 Provision for loan losses for the quarter ended 12,542 2,673 825 Loans charged off: Current period net charge- offs $ 9,364 $ 2,526 $ 1,131 Previously established specific reserves 7,940 -- -- ------------- -------------- --------------- Net charge-offs for the quarter ended $ 17,304 $ 2,526 $ 1,131 ============= ============== =============== NPLs / total loans 6.41% 8.18% 7.44% NPAs / total assets 5.63 6.55 6.85 ALL / total loans 1.75 2.37 2.34 ALL / NPLs 27.25 28.96 31.53Total non-performing loans decreased 23.2% to $45.6 million at December 31, 2011 from $59.3 million at September 30, 2011 and 16.3% from $54.5 million at December 31, 2010. The ratio of non-performing loans to total loans decreased to 6.41% during the quarter compared to 8.18% at September 30, 2011 and 7.44% at December 31, 2010, primarily due to charge-offs recorded during the quarter. During the fourth quarter of 2011, non-performing loans decreased primarily due to $17.4 million of gross charge-offs and $2.9 million of transfers to other real estate owned, which were offset by $6.3 million of loans transferred to non-accrual status. The $17.4 million of charge-offs included $7.9 million of previously established specific reserves, a $2.9 million charge-off on a $4.4 million commercial construction and land development loan which was based on the receipt of a new bulk sale appraisal value during the quarter, and a $1.6 million charge-off on a $1.9 million commercial non-owner occupied loan secured by an office building based on an updated appraisal.
The provision for loan losses increased to $12.5 million for the fourth quarter of 2011 compared to $2.7 million for the third quarter of 2011 and $825,000 for the fourth quarter of 2010. The increase during the fourth quarter of 2011 was primarily related to higher levels of loan charge-offs and the related impact on the historical loss experience factors utilized in the allowance for loan losses methodology.
The ratio of the allowance for loan losses to total loans decreased to 1.75% at December 31, 2011 compared to 2.37% and 2.34%, respectively, at September 30, 2011 and December 31, 2010, primarily due to the charge-off of $7.9 million of previously established specific reserves during the quarter as new information obtained for these non-performing loans indicated they should be considered collateral dependent loans. When it is determined that a non-performing collateral-dependent loan has a collateral shortfall, management immediately charges-off the collateral shortfall. As a result, the Company is not required to maintain an allowance for loan losses on these loans as the loan balance has already been written down to its net realizable value (fair value less estimated costs to sell the collateral). As such, the ratio of the allowance for loan losses to total loans and the ratio of the allowance for loan losses to non-performing loans have been negatively affected by cumulative partial charge-offs of $15.1 million recorded through December 31, 2011 on $18.2 million (net of charge-offs) on non-performing collateral dependent loans.
During the fourth quarter, the Bank sold $560,000 of other real estate owned, recognizing pre-tax net gains on the sales of $63,000. The Bank currently has contracts on five separate other real estate owned properties which should reduce non-performing assets by an additional $1.3 million during the first quarter of 2012 with no anticipated loss on sale, presuming the transactions close as scheduled and pursuant to the contractual terms.
Balance Sheet and Capital
12/31/2011 9/30/2011 12/31/2010 ------------ ------------ ------------ (Dollars in thousands) Assets: Total assets $ 1,148,950 $ 1,168,481 $ 1,121,676 Interest-bearing deposits 59,090 84,344 37,130 Investment securities 250,752 232,804 214,302 Loans receivable, net of unearned fees 711,226 725,467 732,584 Liabilities and Equity: Total liabilities $ 1,045,702 $ 1,053,726 $ 1,008,748 Deposits 977,424 986,441 945,884 Borrowed funds 54,200 56,115 53,550 Shareholders' equity 103,248 114,755 112,928Loans Receivable
12/31/2011 9/30/2011 12/31/2010 --------------- --------------- --------------- % of % of % of Amount Total Amount Total Amount Total -------- ----- -------- ----- -------- ----- (Dollars in thousands) Commercial loans: Commercial and industrial $ 85,160 12.0% $ 83,569 11.5% $ 74,940 10.3% Commercial real estate - owner occupied 93,833 13.2 100,244 13.8 99,435 13.6 Commercial real estate - non-owner occupied 188,293 26.5 193,267 26.7 191,998 26.2 Commercial real estate - multifamily 71,876 10.1 70,129 9.7 72,080 9.8 Commercial construction and land development 22,045 3.1 22,635 3.1 24,310 3.3 Commercial participations 12,053 1.7 16,739 2.3 23,594 3.2 -------- ----- -------- ----- -------- ----- Total commercial loans 473,260 66.6 486,583 67.1 486,357 66.4 Retail loans: One-to-four family residential 181,698 25.6 181,025 25.0 185,321 25.3 Home equity lines of credit 52,873 7.4 53,953 7.4 56,177 7.7 Retail construction and land development 1,022 .1 1,299 .2 3,176 .4 Other 2,771 .4 3,007 .4 2,122 .3 -------- ----- -------- ----- -------- ----- Total retail loans 238,364 33.5 239,284 33.0 246,796 33.7 -------- ----- -------- ----- -------- ----- Total loans receivable 711,624 100.1 725,867 100.1 733,153 100.1 Net deferred loan fees (398) (.1) (400) (.1) (569) (.1) -------- ----- -------- ----- -------- ----- Total loans receivable, net of unearned fees $711,226 100.0% $725,467 100.0% $732,584 100.0% ======== ===== ======== ===== ======== =====Loan fundings during the three months ended December 31, 2011 totaled $32.7 million compared to loan fundings of $20.3 million for the three months ended September 30, 2011 and $30.6 million for the three months ended December 31, 2010, reflecting an increase in loan demand during the current year period. The Bank’s business banking pipeline continues to improve. Loan fundings during the fourth quarter of 2011 were offset by loan payoffs and repayments of $16.2 million, transfers to other real estate owned totaling $2.9 million, and gross charge-offs of $17.4 million.
Through the execution of our Strategic Growth and Diversification Plan and our focus on lending to small- to medium-sized businesses, we continue to diversify our loan portfolio and reduce loans not meeting our current defined risk tolerance. The Company’s targeted growth segments within the loan portfolio, including commercial and industrial, commercial real estate – owner occupied, and multifamily commercial real estate, increased to 53.0% of the commercial loan portfolio at December 31, 2011 compared to 50.7% at December 31, 2010. Commercial participations decreased $4.7 million, or 28.0%, to $12.1 million compared to $16.7 million at September 30, 2011 and $11.5 million, or 48.9%, compared to $23.6 million at December 31, 2010. The decrease in participation loans is primarily due to charge-offs and transfers to other real estate owned during the quarter and year to date period.
During the fourth quarter of 2011, the Bank sold $10.3 million of conforming one-to-four family fixed-rate mortgage loans to Fannie Mae and recorded a gain on sale of $188,000.
Deposits
12/31/2011 9/30/2011 12/31/2010 --------------- --------------- --------------- % of % of % of Amount Total Amount Total Amount Total --------- ----- --------- ----- --------- ----- (Dollars in thousands) Checking accounts: Non-interest bearing $ 96,321 9.9% $ 106,476 10.8% $ 90,315 9.5% Interest-bearing 175,150 17.9 172,007 17.4 149,948 15.9 Money market accounts 192,593 19.7 185,906 18.9 177,566 18.8 Savings accounts 133,292 13.6 132,378 13.4 121,504 12.8 --------- ----- --------- ----- --------- ----- Core deposits 597,356 61.1 596,767 60.5 539,333 57.0 Certificates of deposit accounts 380,068 38.9 389,674 39.5 406,551 43.0 --------- ----- --------- ----- --------- ----- Total deposits $ 977,424 100.0% $ 986,441 100.0% $ 945,884 100.0% ========= ===== ========= ===== ========= =====The Bank strives to grow deposits through many channels including enhancing its brand recognition within its communities, offering attractive deposit products, bringing in new client relationships by meeting all of their banking needs, and holding its experienced sales team accountable for growing deposits and relationships. The decrease in non-interest bearing deposits during the fourth quarter of 2011 is primarily due to the loss of deposits related to a large business client exiting bankruptcy and moving their primary banking relationship to one of the equity participant-subsidiary banks. Since December 31, 2010, the Bank has increased its core deposits by $58.0 million, or 10.8%, and core deposits at December 31, 2011 represent 61.1% of total deposits compared to 57.0% at December 31, 2010. Increasing core deposits is reflective of our success in deepening our client relationships, one of our core Strategic Plan objectives.
Borrowed Funds
12/31/2011 9/30/2011 12/31/2010 ---------- ---------- ---------- (Dollars in thousands) Short-term variable-rate repurchase agreements $ 14,334 $ 16,175 $ 13,352 FHLB advances 39,866 39,940 40,198 ---------- ---------- ---------- Total borrowed funds $ 54,200 $ 56,115 $ 53,550 ========== ========== ==========Borrowed funds decreased during the fourth quarter of 2011 primarily due to decreased borrowings from repurchase agreements, which will fluctuate depending on the client’s liquidity levels.
Shareholders’ Equity
Shareholders’ equity at December 31, 2011 decreased $11.5 million to $103.2 million from $114.8 million at September 30, 2011, and decreased $9.7 million from $112.9 million at December 31, 2010. The decrease in shareholders’ equity during the fourth quarter of 2011 was primarily related to the net loss for the quarter, partially offset by the $1.2 million decrease in accumulated other comprehensive loss.
At December 31, 2011, the Company’s tangible common equity was $103.2 million, or 8.99% of assets, compared to $112.9 million, or 10.07% of assets at December 31, 2010. At December 31, 2011, the Bank’s core and risk-based capital ratios exceeded “minimum” and “well capitalized” regulatory capital requirements.
Company Profile
CFS Bancorp, Inc. is the parent of Citizens Financial Bank, a $1.1 billion asset federal savings bank. Citizens Financial Bank is an independent bank focusing its people, products, and services on helping individuals, businesses, and communities to be successful. The Bank has 22 full-service banking centers throughout adjoining markets in Chicago’s Southwest suburbs and Northwest Indiana. The Company’s website can be found at www.citz.com.
Forward-Looking Information
This press release contains certain forward-looking statements and information relating to the Company that is based on the beliefs of management as well as assumptions made by and information currently available to management. These forward-looking statements include but are not limited to statements regarding our ability to successfully execute our strategy and our Strategic Growth and Diversification Plan, the level and sufficiency of our current regulatory capital and equity ratios, our ability to continue to diversify the loan portfolio, our efforts at deepening client relationships, increasing our levels of core deposits, lowering our non-performing asset levels, managing and reducing our credit-related costs, increasing our revenue growth and levels of earning assets, the effects of general economic and competitive conditions nationally and within our core market area, our ability to sell other real estate owned properties, levels of provision for and the allowance for loan losses, amounts of charge-offs, levels of loan and deposit growth, interest on loans, asset yields and cost of funds, net interest income, net interest margin, non-interest income, non-interest expense, the interest rate environment, and other risk factors identified in the Company’s filings it makes with the Securities and Exchange Commission. In addition, the words “anticipate,” “believe,” “estimate,” “expect,” “indicate,” “intend,” “should,” and similar expressions, or the negative thereof, as well as statements that include future events, tense, or dates, or that are not historical or current facts, as they relate to the Company or the Company’s management, are intended to identify forward-looking statements. Such statements reflect the current views of the Company with respect to future events and are subject to certain risks, uncertainties, assumptions, and changes in circumstances. Forward-looking statements are not guarantees of future performance or outcomes, and actual results or events may differ materially from those included in these statements. The Company does not intend to update these forward-looking statements unless required to under the federal securities laws.
SELECTED CONSOLIDATED FINANCIALS AND OTHER DATA FOLLOW
CFS BANCORP, INC. Consolidated Statements of Income (Loss) (Unaudited) (Dollars in thousands, except per share data) Three Months Ended Year Ended ------------------------------------ ------------------------ December September December December December 31, 2011 30, 2011 31, 2010 31, 2011 31, 2010 ----------- ----------- ----------- ----------- ----------- Interest income: Loans receivable $ 8,625 $ 8,871 $ 9,179 $ 35,315 $ 37,682 Investment securities 2,015 1,794 2,053 7,894 8,605 Other interest- earning assets 94 80 146 495 483 ----------- ----------- ----------- ----------- ----------- Total interest income 10,734 10,745 11,378 43,704 46,770 Interest expense: Deposits 1,464 1,602 2,032 6,736 8,374 Borrowed funds 304 294 421 1,117 1,813 ----------- ----------- ----------- ----------- ----------- Total interest expense 1,768 1,896 2,453 7,853 10,187 ----------- ----------- ----------- ----------- ----------- Net interest income 8,966 8,849 8,925 35,851 36,583 Provision for loan losses 12,542 2,673 825 17,114 3,877 ----------- ----------- ----------- ----------- ----------- Net interest income (expense) after provision for loan losses (3,576) 6,176 8,100 18,737 32,706 Non-interest income: Service charges and other fees 1,154 1,263 1,284 4,667 5,114 Card-based fees 520 520 469 2,035 1,867 Commission income 36 100 28 259 168 Net gain (loss) on sale of: Investment securities 265 758 233 1,715 689 Loans held for sale 188 76 178 330 178 Other real estate owned 63 266 (168) 2,562 (154) Income from bank-owned life insurance 180 216 191 812 893 Other income 128 121 110 471 481 ----------- ----------- ----------- ----------- ----------- Total non- interest income 2,534 3,320 2,325 12,851 9,236 Non-interest expense: Compensation and employee benefits 4,319 4,818 4,777 19,423 18,705 Net occupancy expense 677 706 735 2,818 2,832 FDIC insurance premiums and regulatory assessments 483 481 660 2,121 2,551 Professional fees 354 309 433 1,385 2,283 Furniture and equipment expense 449 436 426 1,802 1,973 Data processing 433 424 438 1,740 1,754 Marketing 244 213 262 914 781 Other real estate owned related expense, net 906 614 127 4,123 1,483 Loan collection expense 244 117 160 714 638 Severance and retirement compensation expense 1,375 -- 17 1,375 545 Other general and administrative expenses 1,409 1,068 1,240 4,702 4,230 ----------- ----------- ----------- ----------- ----------- Total non- interest expense 10,893 9,186 9,275 41,117 37,775 ----------- ----------- ----------- ----------- ----------- Income (loss) before income tax expense (benefit) (11,935) 310 1,150 (9,529) 4,167 Income tax (benefit) expense 638 (84) 232 945 707 ----------- ----------- ----------- ----------- ----------- Net income (loss) $ (12,573) $ 394 $ 918 $ (10,474) $ 3,460 =========== =========== =========== =========== =========== Basic earnings (loss) per share $ (1.17) $ .04 $ .09 $ (.98) $ .33 Diluted earnings (loss) per share $ (1.17) $ .04 $ .09 $ (.98) $ .32 Weighted- average common and common share equivalents outstanding: Basic 10,699,996 10,693,724 10,662,792 10,684,133 10,635,939 Diluted 10,742,480 10,753,386 10,719,886 10,740,602 10,705,814 CFS BANCORP, INC. Consolidated Statements of Condition (Unaudited) (Dollars in thousands) December 31, September 30, December 31, 2011 2011 2010 ------------ ------------- ------------ ASSETS Cash and amounts due from depository institutions $ 32,982 $ 33,421 $ 24,624 Interest-bearing deposits 59,090 84,344 37,130 ------------ ------------- ------------ Cash and cash equivalents 92,072 117,765 61,754 Investment securities available- for-sale, at fair value 234,381 218,417 197,101 Investment securities held-to- maturity, at cost 16,371 14,387 17,201 Investment in Federal Home Loan Bank stock, at cost 6,188 8,638 20,282 Loans receivable, net of unearned fees 711,226 725,467 732,584 Allowance for loan losses (12,424) (17,186) (17,179) ------------ ------------- ------------ Net loans 698,802 708,281 715,405 Loans held for sale 1,124 839 -- Investment in bank-owned life insurance 36,275 36,095 35,463 Accrued interest receivable 3,011 2,908 3,162 Other real estate owned 19,091 17,195 22,324 Office properties and equipment 17,539 18,053 20,464 Net deferred tax assets 16,273 17,708 17,923 Prepaid expenses and other assets 7,823 8,195 10,597 ------------ ------------- ------------ Total assets $ 1,148,950 $ 1,168,481 $ 1,121,676 ============ ============= ============ LIABILITIES AND SHAREHOLDERS' EQUITY Deposits $ 977,424 $ 986,441 $ 945,884 Borrowed funds 54,200 56,115 53,550 Advance payments by borrowers for taxes and insurance 4,275 5,868 4,618 Other liabilities 9,803 5,302 4,696 ------------ ------------- ------------ Total liabilities 1,045,702 1,053,726 1,008,748 Shareholders' Equity: Preferred stock, $0.01 par value; 15,000,000 shares authorized -- -- -- Common stock, $0.01 par value; 85,000,000 shares authorized; 23,423,306 shares issued; 10,874,668, 10,877,015, and 10,850,040 shares outstanding 234 234 234 Additional paid-in capital 187,030 187,023 187,164 Retained earnings 72,683 85,365 83,592 Treasury stock, at cost; 12,548,638, 12,546,291, and 12,573,266 shares (154,773) (154,766) (155,112) Accumulated other comprehensive loss, net of tax (1,926) (3,101) (2,950) ------------ ------------- ------------ Total shareholders' equity 103,248 114,755 112,928 ------------ ------------- ------------ Total liabilities and shareholders' equity $ 1,148,950 $ 1,168,481 $ 1,121,676 ============ ============= ============ CFS BANCORP, INC. Selected Financial Data (Unaudited) (Dollars in thousands, except per share data) December 31, September 30, December 31, 2011 2011 2010 ------------- ------------- ------------- Book value per share $ 9.49 $ 10.55 $ 10.41 Tangible book value per share 9.49 10.55 10.41 Shareholders' equity to total assets 8.99% 9.82% 10.07% Core capital ratio (Bank only) 8.26 8.87 9.07 Total risk-based capital ratio (Bank only) 12.65 13.57 13.32 Common shares outstanding 10,874,668 10,877,015 10,850,040 Employees (FTE) 303 311 322 Number of full service banking centers 22 22 22 Three Months Ended Year Ended --------------------------------- ---------------------- December September December December December 31, 2011 30, 2011 31, 2010 31, 2011 31, 2010 ---------- ---------- ---------- ---------- ---------- Average Balance Data: Total assets $1,161,928 $1,150,149 $1,135,865 $1,146,118 $1,105,333 Loans receivable, net of unearned fees 724,562 730,524 728,849 728,811 747,768 Investment securities 253,061 239,655 220,489 249,953 208,450 Interest-earning assets 1,053,452 1,036,064 1,015,374 1,032,346 995,864 Deposits 979,320 972,486 946,431 973,641 905,935 Interest-bearing deposits 875,221 871,637 848,079 873,494 813,799 Non-interest bearing deposits 104,099 100,849 98,352 100,147 92,136 Interest-bearing liabilities 931,800 922,049 910,765 919,886 889,444 Shareholders' equity 114,793 116,408 114,203 115,096 112,601 Performance Ratios (annualized): Return on average assets (4.29)% .14% .32% (.91)% .31% Return on average equity (43.45) 1.34 3.19 (9.10) 3.07 Average yield on interest- earning assets 4.04 4.11 4.45 4.23 4.70 Average cost of interest- bearing liabilities .75 .82 1.07 .85 1.15 Interest rate spread 3.29 3.29 3.38 3.38 3.55 Net interest margin 3.38 3.39 3.49 3.47 3.68 Non-interest expense to average assets 3.72 3.17 3.24 3.59 3.42 Efficiency ratio (1) 96.96 80.50 84.19 87.51 83.70 Cash dividends declared per share $ .01 $ .01 $ .01 $ .04 $ .04 Market price per share of common stock for the period ended: Close $ 4.31 $ 4.34 $ 5.23 $ 4.31 $ 5.23 High 4.89 5.70 5.48 5.90 6.24 Low 4.12 4.34 4.60 4.12 3.02 ------------------ (1) The efficiency ratio is calculated by dividing non-interest expense by the sum of net interest income and non-interest income, excluding net gain on sales of investment securities. CFS BANCORP, INC. Reconciliation of Income Before Income Taxes to Pre-Tax, Pre-Provision Earnings, as adjusted (Unaudited) (Dollars in thousands) Three Months Ended ---------------------------------- December September December 31, 2011 30, 2011 31, 2010 ---------- ---------- ---------- Income (loss) before income taxes (benefit) $ (11,935) $ 310 $ 1,150 Provision for loan losses 12,542 2,673 825 ---------- ---------- ---------- Pre-tax, pre-provision earnings 607 2,983 1,975 Add back (subtract): Net gain on sale of investment securities (265) (758) (233) Net (gain) loss on sale of other real estate owned (63) (266) 168 Other real estate owned related expense, net 906 614 127 Loan collection expense 244 117 160 Severance and retirement compensation expense 1,375 -- 17 ---------- ---------- ---------- Pre-tax, pre-provision earnings, as adjusted $ 2,804 $ 2,690 $ 2,214 ========== ========== ========== Pre-tax, pre-provision earnings, as adjusted, to average assets (annualized) .96% .93% .77% ========== ========== ========== Twelve Months Ended ---------------------- December December 31, 2011 31, 2010 ---------- ---------- Income (loss) before income taxes (benefit) $ (9,529) $ 4,167 Provision for loan losses 17,114 3,877 ---------- ---------- Pre-tax, pre-provision earnings 7,585 8,044 Add back (subtract): Net gain on sale of investment securities (1,715) (689) Net (gain) loss on sale of other real estate owned (2,562) 154 Other real estate owned related expense, net 4,123 1,483 Loan collection expense 714 638 Severance and retirement compensation expense 1,375 545 ---------- ---------- Pre-tax, pre-provision earnings, as adjusted $ 9,520 $ 10,175 ========== ========== Pre-tax, pre-provision earnings, as adjusted, to average assets .83% .92% ========== ==========The Company’s accounting and reporting policies conform to U.S. generally accepted accounting principles (GAAP) and general practice within the banking industry. Management uses certain non-GAAP financial measures to evaluate the Company’s financial performance and has provided the non-GAAP financial measures of pre-tax, pre-provision earnings, as adjusted, and pre-tax, pre-provision earnings, as adjusted, to average assets. In these non-GAAP financial measures, the provision for loan losses, other real estate owned related income and expense, loan collection expense, and certain other items, such as gains and losses on sales of investment securities and other assets, and severance and retirement compensation expenses are excluded. Management believes that these measures are useful because they provide a more comparable basis for evaluating financial performance excluding certain credit-related costs and other non-recurring items period to period and allows management and others to assess the Company’s ability to generate pre-tax earnings to cover the Company’s provision for loan losses and other credit-related costs. Although these non-GAAP financial measures are intended to enhance investors understanding of the Company’s business performance, these operating measures should not be considered as an alternative to GAAP.
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2012年1月31日星期二
Peter O'Malley teams with South Korea investor in bid for Dodgers
Peter O’Malley’s bid to buy back the Dodgers is supported by financing from the South Korean conglomerate E-Land, two people familiar with the Dodgers’ sale process said Monday.
If the O’Malley bid is successful, E-Land Chairman Song Soo Park will become a major investor in the Dodgers, one of the people said.
The ownership group also would have investors from Los Angeles. O’Malley has had discussions with Tony Ressler, a minority owner of the Milwaukee Brewers and co-founder of Los Angeles-based Ares Capital, according to a person familiar with the talks.
O’Malley would be the Dodgers’ chief executive. Foreign investment is not necessarily an obstacle to MLB ownership; the Seattle Mariners’ ownership group includes a significant Japanese presence.
An E-Land spokesman confirmed Tuesday the company is involved in the Dodgers bidding but would not elaborate. O’Malley declined to comment.
On Tuesday, as South Koreans woke up to the news that local investors might own one of America’s most storied baseball teams, the Korean Baseball Organization — the top professional league in South Korea — had no comment.
Among the baseball fans in chat rooms and on bulletin boards, the reaction leaned negative.
Rather than being proud of owning a foreign franchise as a way to extend Korean cultural and economic influence abroad, many fans here wondered why their moneyed elite didn’t invest their millions in Korean clubs. And, despite the experience of the Mariners, the fans expressed skepticism that foreign-backed ownership would be permitted.
“If an outsider could purchase a Major League Baseball team, then Chinese companies would’ve gotten their hands on it already,” wrote one bulletin board contributor.
Wrote another: “Why won’t they invest in finding a new Korean Baseball team instead?”
The people who liked the idea said it would pave the way for more Korean talent to make its way to the major leagues.
“Having a hand in the Dodgers will allow Korean players to more easily make the jump. It’s good marketing,” wrote one fan.
O’Malley is one of at least eight prospective owners to make last Friday’s first cut.
The others include East Coast investment baron Steven Cohen, St. Louis Rams owner Stan Kroenke, and groups led by Magic Johnson, Beverly Hills developer Alan Casden, Los Angeles developer Rick Caruso and former Dodgers manager Joe Torre, investor and civic leader Stanley Gold and the family of the late Roy Disney, and New York media investor Leo Hindery and investor Tom Barrack of Santa Monica-based Colony Capital.
Frank McCourt, the Dodgers’ departing owner, expects the team to sell for at least $1.5 billion. That would be almost double the previous record price for a major league club, set when the Ricketts family bought the Chicago Cubs for $845 million in 2009.
Under O’Malley, the Dodgers were pioneers in international baseball, particularly in Asia. In 1994, three years before O’Malley sold the team to News Corp., Dodgers pitcher Chan Ho Park became the first Korean player to appear in a major league game.
In November, O’Malley joined Park and former Dodgers pitcher Hideo Nomo — the second Japanese player to appear in the majors — in an investment partnership to own and operate the Dodgers’ old spring home in Vero Beach, Fla. Park and Nomo agreed to use their homeland connections to help lure teams, camps and clinics to Vero Beach.
E-Land, a dominant fashion retailer in South Korea, has expanded its business interests into such areas as hotels and resorts, restaurants and construction, according to the company website. The company is family-run and privately held.
According to the E-Land website, the company opened its first U.S. retail store in 2007 at a mall in Stamford, Conn., under the brand name “Who A.U.” The slogan for the brand: California Dream.
bill.shaikin@latimes.com
twitter.com/BillShaikin
Shaikin reported from Los Angeles and Glionna reported from Seoul.
http://tourism9.com/ http://vkins.com/
If the O’Malley bid is successful, E-Land Chairman Song Soo Park will become a major investor in the Dodgers, one of the people said.
The ownership group also would have investors from Los Angeles. O’Malley has had discussions with Tony Ressler, a minority owner of the Milwaukee Brewers and co-founder of Los Angeles-based Ares Capital, according to a person familiar with the talks.
O’Malley would be the Dodgers’ chief executive. Foreign investment is not necessarily an obstacle to MLB ownership; the Seattle Mariners’ ownership group includes a significant Japanese presence.
An E-Land spokesman confirmed Tuesday the company is involved in the Dodgers bidding but would not elaborate. O’Malley declined to comment.
On Tuesday, as South Koreans woke up to the news that local investors might own one of America’s most storied baseball teams, the Korean Baseball Organization — the top professional league in South Korea — had no comment.
Among the baseball fans in chat rooms and on bulletin boards, the reaction leaned negative.
Rather than being proud of owning a foreign franchise as a way to extend Korean cultural and economic influence abroad, many fans here wondered why their moneyed elite didn’t invest their millions in Korean clubs. And, despite the experience of the Mariners, the fans expressed skepticism that foreign-backed ownership would be permitted.
“If an outsider could purchase a Major League Baseball team, then Chinese companies would’ve gotten their hands on it already,” wrote one bulletin board contributor.
Wrote another: “Why won’t they invest in finding a new Korean Baseball team instead?”
The people who liked the idea said it would pave the way for more Korean talent to make its way to the major leagues.
“Having a hand in the Dodgers will allow Korean players to more easily make the jump. It’s good marketing,” wrote one fan.
O’Malley is one of at least eight prospective owners to make last Friday’s first cut.
The others include East Coast investment baron Steven Cohen, St. Louis Rams owner Stan Kroenke, and groups led by Magic Johnson, Beverly Hills developer Alan Casden, Los Angeles developer Rick Caruso and former Dodgers manager Joe Torre, investor and civic leader Stanley Gold and the family of the late Roy Disney, and New York media investor Leo Hindery and investor Tom Barrack of Santa Monica-based Colony Capital.
Frank McCourt, the Dodgers’ departing owner, expects the team to sell for at least $1.5 billion. That would be almost double the previous record price for a major league club, set when the Ricketts family bought the Chicago Cubs for $845 million in 2009.
Under O’Malley, the Dodgers were pioneers in international baseball, particularly in Asia. In 1994, three years before O’Malley sold the team to News Corp., Dodgers pitcher Chan Ho Park became the first Korean player to appear in a major league game.
In November, O’Malley joined Park and former Dodgers pitcher Hideo Nomo — the second Japanese player to appear in the majors — in an investment partnership to own and operate the Dodgers’ old spring home in Vero Beach, Fla. Park and Nomo agreed to use their homeland connections to help lure teams, camps and clinics to Vero Beach.
E-Land, a dominant fashion retailer in South Korea, has expanded its business interests into such areas as hotels and resorts, restaurants and construction, according to the company website. The company is family-run and privately held.
According to the E-Land website, the company opened its first U.S. retail store in 2007 at a mall in Stamford, Conn., under the brand name “Who A.U.” The slogan for the brand: California Dream.
bill.shaikin@latimes.com
twitter.com/BillShaikin
Shaikin reported from Los Angeles and Glionna reported from Seoul.
http://tourism9.com/ http://vkins.com/
2012年1月27日星期五
UnitedHealth Group Provides $15 Million to Help Fund Connections Housing Residential Community in San Diego
SAN DIEGO–(BUSINESS WIRE)– UnitedHealth Group (NYSE:UNH – News) announced $15 million in financing to help build Connections Housing, an integrated service and residential community in San Diego that will provide permanent supportive housing to homeless people in the region.
The investment is part of UnitedHealth Group’s partnership with Enterprise Community Investment, Inc. (Enterprise), a national leader in the affordable-housing and community-development industry, to provide up to $50 million to finance affordable-housing projects in targeted communities throughout the United States.
The Connections Housing community development project includes acquiring, rehabilitating and converting the historic World Trade Center in Downtown San Diego to create a permanent year-round shelter, housing and an array of services for homeless people. Affirmed Housing Group (AHG) and PATH Ventures are the co-developers and general partners for the project, with Family Health Centers of San Diego and People Assisting the Homeless (PATH) as community partners.
The multi-use project will serve as a one-stop service center and housing for homeless people. The residential portion will consist of 73 studio units of permanent supportive housing, 16 “transitional” housing units and 134 additional transitional housing beds. The project will also provide resources a person needs to break the cycle of homelessness. This includes a primary health care clinic, a multiservice homeless center, a large commercial kitchen, related dining facilities and administrative offices, among other amenities.
“UnitedHealth Group is grateful for the opportunity to work with Enterprise and the many state and local organizations to give hope and new beginnings to San Diegans in need,” said Steven Henry, director for community investment management, UnitedHealth Group. “The UnitedHealth Group Affordable Housing Investment Program is just one example of how the private and public sectors work together to build stronger communities and make a difference in the lives of people most vulnerable.”
The UnitedHealth Group Affordable Housing Investment Program invests in projects that qualify for federal Low Income Housing Tax Credits (Housing Credit) or Historic Rehabilitation Tax Credits. Through Enterprise, the program provides critical equity for the development of affordable rental housing developments to which housing tax credits have been allocated. UnitedHealth Group’s $50 million commitment supports efforts to strengthen local community-based organizations that create affordable housing with a focus on serving low-income families, households with special needs and the growing population of aging adults.
“Enterprise is proud to partner with UnitedHealth Group to provide much-needed Housing Credits for the development of an important resource for homeless people in San Diego,” said Raoul Moore, senior vice president of Syndication at Enterprise Community Investment. “Connections Housing is a national model for reversing homelessness, and Enterprise is pleased to be a part of the development team.”
UnitedHealth Group’s UnitedHealthcare business offers health benefits, including commercial and Medicare health plans, to more than 2.3 million Californians and partners with about 50,000 physicians across the state. OptumHealth provides behavioral health administrative services for Medicaid members in San Diego County and operates the county’s Access and Crisis line.
Enterprise helps communities build and preserve affordable housing and has a history of financing good-quality homes and apartment buildings that are specifically intended to be affordable to low- and modest-income people and families.
The UnitedHealth Group Affordable Housing Investment Program is one of several company initiatives that provide millions of dollars each year to help fund local infrastructure projects to improve the quality of life for residents in communities where UnitedHealth Group conducts business. For example, the California Health Care Investment Program has provided more than $200 million in total capital to 29 health care organizations statewide that serve low-income, underserved and underinsured communities and populations.
About Enterprise Community Investment, Inc.
Enterprise is a leading provider of the development capital and expertise it takes to create decent, affordable homes and rebuild communities. For 30 years, Enterprise has introduced neighborhood solutions through public-private partnerships with financial institutions, governments, community organizations and others that share our vision. Enterprise has raised and invested more than $11 billion in equity, grants and loans to help build or preserve nearly 300,000 affordable rental and for-sale homes to create vital communities. Visit www.EnterpriseCommunity.org and www.EnterpriseCommunity.com to learn more about Enterprise’s efforts to build communities and opportunity.
About UnitedHealth Group
UnitedHealth Group (NYSE: UNH – News) is a diversified health and well-being company dedicated to helping people live healthier lives and making health care work better. With headquarters in Minnetonka, Minn., UnitedHealth Group offers a broad spectrum of products and services through two distinct platforms: UnitedHealthcare, which provides health care coverage and benefits services; and Optum, which provides information and technology-enabled health services. Through its businesses, UnitedHealth Group serves more than 75 million people worldwide. Visit UnitedHealth Group at www.unitedhealthgroup.com for more information.
http://tourism9.com/ http://vkins.com/
The investment is part of UnitedHealth Group’s partnership with Enterprise Community Investment, Inc. (Enterprise), a national leader in the affordable-housing and community-development industry, to provide up to $50 million to finance affordable-housing projects in targeted communities throughout the United States.
The Connections Housing community development project includes acquiring, rehabilitating and converting the historic World Trade Center in Downtown San Diego to create a permanent year-round shelter, housing and an array of services for homeless people. Affirmed Housing Group (AHG) and PATH Ventures are the co-developers and general partners for the project, with Family Health Centers of San Diego and People Assisting the Homeless (PATH) as community partners.
The multi-use project will serve as a one-stop service center and housing for homeless people. The residential portion will consist of 73 studio units of permanent supportive housing, 16 “transitional” housing units and 134 additional transitional housing beds. The project will also provide resources a person needs to break the cycle of homelessness. This includes a primary health care clinic, a multiservice homeless center, a large commercial kitchen, related dining facilities and administrative offices, among other amenities.
“UnitedHealth Group is grateful for the opportunity to work with Enterprise and the many state and local organizations to give hope and new beginnings to San Diegans in need,” said Steven Henry, director for community investment management, UnitedHealth Group. “The UnitedHealth Group Affordable Housing Investment Program is just one example of how the private and public sectors work together to build stronger communities and make a difference in the lives of people most vulnerable.”
The UnitedHealth Group Affordable Housing Investment Program invests in projects that qualify for federal Low Income Housing Tax Credits (Housing Credit) or Historic Rehabilitation Tax Credits. Through Enterprise, the program provides critical equity for the development of affordable rental housing developments to which housing tax credits have been allocated. UnitedHealth Group’s $50 million commitment supports efforts to strengthen local community-based organizations that create affordable housing with a focus on serving low-income families, households with special needs and the growing population of aging adults.
“Enterprise is proud to partner with UnitedHealth Group to provide much-needed Housing Credits for the development of an important resource for homeless people in San Diego,” said Raoul Moore, senior vice president of Syndication at Enterprise Community Investment. “Connections Housing is a national model for reversing homelessness, and Enterprise is pleased to be a part of the development team.”
UnitedHealth Group’s UnitedHealthcare business offers health benefits, including commercial and Medicare health plans, to more than 2.3 million Californians and partners with about 50,000 physicians across the state. OptumHealth provides behavioral health administrative services for Medicaid members in San Diego County and operates the county’s Access and Crisis line.
Enterprise helps communities build and preserve affordable housing and has a history of financing good-quality homes and apartment buildings that are specifically intended to be affordable to low- and modest-income people and families.
The UnitedHealth Group Affordable Housing Investment Program is one of several company initiatives that provide millions of dollars each year to help fund local infrastructure projects to improve the quality of life for residents in communities where UnitedHealth Group conducts business. For example, the California Health Care Investment Program has provided more than $200 million in total capital to 29 health care organizations statewide that serve low-income, underserved and underinsured communities and populations.
About Enterprise Community Investment, Inc.
Enterprise is a leading provider of the development capital and expertise it takes to create decent, affordable homes and rebuild communities. For 30 years, Enterprise has introduced neighborhood solutions through public-private partnerships with financial institutions, governments, community organizations and others that share our vision. Enterprise has raised and invested more than $11 billion in equity, grants and loans to help build or preserve nearly 300,000 affordable rental and for-sale homes to create vital communities. Visit www.EnterpriseCommunity.org and www.EnterpriseCommunity.com to learn more about Enterprise’s efforts to build communities and opportunity.
About UnitedHealth Group
UnitedHealth Group (NYSE: UNH – News) is a diversified health and well-being company dedicated to helping people live healthier lives and making health care work better. With headquarters in Minnetonka, Minn., UnitedHealth Group offers a broad spectrum of products and services through two distinct platforms: UnitedHealthcare, which provides health care coverage and benefits services; and Optum, which provides information and technology-enabled health services. Through its businesses, UnitedHealth Group serves more than 75 million people worldwide. Visit UnitedHealth Group at www.unitedhealthgroup.com for more information.
http://tourism9.com/ http://vkins.com/
2012年1月23日星期一
Private college students: Tackle the CSS Profile
Financial aid season is upon us, and in addition to filling out the Free Application for Federal Student Aid, or FAFSA, the form that qualifies students for federal grants, loans and work-study jobs, some students will also have to file the College Scholarship Service, or CSS, Profile. Used by more than 350 private institutions throughout the U.S., the CSS Profile is much more extensive than the FAFSA and can qualify students for enormous nonfederal financial aid packages funded by their college. Here’s what you need to know.
“(The application) basically asks you about every little bitty detail about parents’ finances and assets,” says Dan Maga II, vice president of American College Funding, a college planning firm in Wilmette, Ill. “It can get down into what kind of car you drive, what kind of church you go to, just about everything under the sun they can ask.”
In addition to the basic CSS Profile, many colleges also add their own supplemental questions to get an even fuller view of your financial situation. The reason, explains Michael McLaughlin, director of financial aid operations at Middlebury College in Middlebury, Vt., is because at private institutions that require the CSS Profile, bigger aid is often at stake. Whereas the FAFSA can only qualify students for a maximum need-based grant package of $9,550 per year — and only the lowest-income students will qualify for a package that big — the average yearly grant package at Middlebury tops $32,000.
“We need to be more diligent on the information that we collect and get a more accurate picture for each student when giving out high amounts of institutional aid,” he says.
The Profile assesses the money you have, but it also takes the money you pay out into consideration by asking questions about your family’s medical expenses, debts, whether your family’s home is underwater, business expenses and other miscellaneous costs that aren’t included on the FAFSA.
The Profile may ask for more information, but that doesn’t necessarily mean all assets will subtract from a student’s financial aid package.
“As far as retirement assets go … we like to have that information available, but it’s not factored into (our) actual aid calculation,” says Kim Downs-Burns, associate vice president for student financial services at Middlebury.
Unlike the FAFSA, which determines how much government aid you’re eligible for regardless of where you attend school, colleges and universities individually decide how to interpret CSS Profile information and which assets and expenses to take into consideration.
“The lower they keep their value, within reason, they’re going to help keep their expected family contribution down and potentially garner more aid,” he explains.
Maga adds that as with the federal aid methodology, many schools also give greater weight to assets held in a student’s name than those held in a parent’s name, though it’s difficult to quantify by exactly how much because aid formulas vary from institution to institution. To up your federal aid eligibility as well as potential aid eligibility on the CSS Profile, Maga recommends that families shift assets from accounts held in a student’s name to those held in a parent’s name prior to filling out either form.
With so many questions, mistakes are easy to make, and deadlines are easy to miss, says Al Hoffman, director of the College Funding Service Center college consulting firm in Waterford, Conn. Whereas the FAFSA is free, goes to all schools and doesn’t become available until Jan. 1 of the year students will attend college, the CSS Profile is limited only to select private schools, costs $25 to submit for the first school applied to and $16 per school after that (fee waivers are available to certain students) and becomes available in fall of the year before the student will attend school.
The CSS Profile is frequently due significantly earlier than the FAFSA as well. Many schools require students applying for early decision or early action to file the application by Nov. 15 of the year before they attend. And regular admission students often must file by Feb.1 of the year they will attend. Financial aid deadlines for both the CSS Profile and the FAFSA vary from school to school and in both cases, families are urged to estimate their income tax figures and submit the forms as early as possible to take advantage of aid awards that are distributed on a first-come, first-serve basis.
“You really can’t wait,” says Hoffman.
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More questions, fewer sheltered accounts
The CSS Profile is a much lengthier application than the FAFSA. That’s because the application considers income streams and assets the FAFSA does not such as retirement accounts, life insurance plans, home equity on a family’s primary residence, and income and assets held by a noncustodial parent in cases of divorce.“(The application) basically asks you about every little bitty detail about parents’ finances and assets,” says Dan Maga II, vice president of American College Funding, a college planning firm in Wilmette, Ill. “It can get down into what kind of car you drive, what kind of church you go to, just about everything under the sun they can ask.”
In addition to the basic CSS Profile, many colleges also add their own supplemental questions to get an even fuller view of your financial situation. The reason, explains Michael McLaughlin, director of financial aid operations at Middlebury College in Middlebury, Vt., is because at private institutions that require the CSS Profile, bigger aid is often at stake. Whereas the FAFSA can only qualify students for a maximum need-based grant package of $9,550 per year — and only the lowest-income students will qualify for a package that big — the average yearly grant package at Middlebury tops $32,000.
“We need to be more diligent on the information that we collect and get a more accurate picture for each student when giving out high amounts of institutional aid,” he says.
The Profile assesses the money you have, but it also takes the money you pay out into consideration by asking questions about your family’s medical expenses, debts, whether your family’s home is underwater, business expenses and other miscellaneous costs that aren’t included on the FAFSA.
The Profile may ask for more information, but that doesn’t necessarily mean all assets will subtract from a student’s financial aid package.
“As far as retirement assets go … we like to have that information available, but it’s not factored into (our) actual aid calculation,” says Kim Downs-Burns, associate vice president for student financial services at Middlebury.
Unlike the FAFSA, which determines how much government aid you’re eligible for regardless of where you attend school, colleges and universities individually decide how to interpret CSS Profile information and which assets and expenses to take into consideration.
Maximizing your aid
The Profile is more thorough than the FAFSA, but there are steps families can take to maximize their aid eligibility. Maga says the number one mistake families make is overestimating the value of their primary home.“The lower they keep their value, within reason, they’re going to help keep their expected family contribution down and potentially garner more aid,” he explains.
Maga adds that as with the federal aid methodology, many schools also give greater weight to assets held in a student’s name than those held in a parent’s name, though it’s difficult to quantify by exactly how much because aid formulas vary from institution to institution. To up your federal aid eligibility as well as potential aid eligibility on the CSS Profile, Maga recommends that families shift assets from accounts held in a student’s name to those held in a parent’s name prior to filling out either form.
With so many questions, mistakes are easy to make, and deadlines are easy to miss, says Al Hoffman, director of the College Funding Service Center college consulting firm in Waterford, Conn. Whereas the FAFSA is free, goes to all schools and doesn’t become available until Jan. 1 of the year students will attend college, the CSS Profile is limited only to select private schools, costs $25 to submit for the first school applied to and $16 per school after that (fee waivers are available to certain students) and becomes available in fall of the year before the student will attend school.
The CSS Profile is frequently due significantly earlier than the FAFSA as well. Many schools require students applying for early decision or early action to file the application by Nov. 15 of the year before they attend. And regular admission students often must file by Feb.1 of the year they will attend. Financial aid deadlines for both the CSS Profile and the FAFSA vary from school to school and in both cases, families are urged to estimate their income tax figures and submit the forms as early as possible to take advantage of aid awards that are distributed on a first-come, first-serve basis.
“You really can’t wait,” says Hoffman.
More From Bankrate.com
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In a Romney Believer, Private Equity’s Risks and Rewards
IT was, the gossip pages would later report, the talk of the Hamptons — a midsummer night’s bacchanal in the playground of the 1 percent.
Beyond the windswept dunes in Bridgehampton, at a $400,000-a-month oceanfront mansion, bright young things bubbled up and the Champagne flowed fast. Into the small hours, professional dancers in exotic clothing gyrated atop platforms. One couple twirled flaming torches. The sounds of techno boomed over the beach.
The New York Post summed up the evening’s Dionysian mysteries with the following headline: “Nude Frolic in Tycoon’s Pool.”
The Post’s tycoon, and the party’s host, was a financier named Marc J. Leder, and those weekend revels last July had the East End of Long Island buzzing. Like many deal makers, though, Mr. Leder, 50, is virtually unknown outside financial circles. But from his headquarters in Boca Raton, Fla., he presides over a multibillion-dollar private empire. He is a practitioner of a Wall Street art that helped define an age of hyperwealth, and which has now been dragged into the white-hot spotlight of presidential politics: private equity.
It was through private equity that one Republican candidate, Mitt Romney, amassed his wealth — and, it turns out, it was through private equity that Mr. Romney first met Mr. Leder. A couple of months after the blowout in Bridgehampton, Mr. Leder was host for a fund-raiser at his Boca Raton home for Mr. Romney’s campaign. But the connection goes back even further. Years ago, a visit to Mr. Romney’s investment firm inspired Mr. Leder to get into private equity in the first place. Mr. Romney was an early investor in some of the deals done by Mr. Leder’s investment company, Sun Capital, which today oversees about $8 billion in equity.
Mr. Romney’s own time in the private equity business, at Bain Capital, has provoked fierce attacks from Republican rivals and others. It has also prompted a lot of questions, including the big one: What good is this business, anyway? Detractors say private equity has enriched a handful of financiers at the expense of ordinary Americans. The deal makers, this line goes, buy companies and then bleed the life out of them. Jobs are often among the casualties.
Whether there’s truth to such claims depends on whom you ask. Private equity executives, as well as Mr. Romney, who left Bain in 1999, say the industry fixes troubled companies and ultimately creates jobs. Whatever the case, three decades after this sort of deal-making burst onto the scene in the merger mania of the 1980s, there are surprisingly few solid answers from either side.
What is certain is that buyout specialists upended the old order and made vast fortunes for themselves. Fueled by easy money from banks, and from endowments and pension funds, these private investors were able to buy companies with borrowed money and put down relatively little of their own cash.
Today, many of these private kingdoms rival the nation’s mightiest public companies. In all, the private equity industry oversees $3 trillion in global assets, according to Preqin, the research firm. Buyout kings control more than 14,000 American companies, including brands like Hilton Hotels and Burger King.
BUT financiers weren’t the only ones to embrace private equity. On the campaign trail, Rick Perry called private equity artists “vulture capitalists.” But as governor of Texas, he blessed the largest corporate buyout in history — the $44.4 billion takeover of the utility TXU by several investment firms in 2007. Indeed, as in many other places nationwide, public pension funds in Texas used public money to bet on private equity, in hopes of generating the investment returns they needed to pay retirees.
Against this backdrop, the story of Marc Leder might seem a footnote in the nation’s economic ledger. But it is a story worth knowing. That’s because, in many ways, Mr. Leder personifies the debates now swirling around this lucrative corner of finance.
To his critics, he represents everything that’s wrong with this setup. In recent years, a large number of the companies that Sun Capital has acquired have run into serious trouble, eliminated jobs or both. Since 2008, some 25 of its companies — roughly one of every five it owns — have filed for bankruptcy.
Among the losers was Friendly’s, the restaurant chain known for its Jim Dandy sundaes and Fribble shakes. (Sun Capital was accused by a federal agency of pushing Friendly’s into bankruptcy last year to avoid paying pensions to the chain’s employees; Sun disputes that contention.) Another company that sank into bankruptcy was Real Mex, owner of the Chevy’s restaurant chain. In that case, Mr. Leder lost money for his investors not once, but twice.
Yet Mr. Leder doesn’t seem to be suffering too much himself. In fact, he is living so large that he can’t avoid the limelight. Last July, he used part of his personal fortune to join a group of investors in buying the Philadelphia 76ers. In December, he was spotted on St. Bart’s with Russell Simmons, of Def Jam and Phat Farm fame, and Rachel Zoe, the celebrity stylist. That again landed him in The New York Post, which dubbed him a “private equity party boy.”
Mr. Leder says that characterization couldn’t be further from the truth. He focuses on what are known as “scratch and dent” deals, which typically involve companies that are struggling to begin with. One-third of the companies Sun Capital has bought are losing money. It’s a tricky game in good times, and downright dangerous in bad ones. Mr. Leder and his defenders say Sun Capital has saved many companies and, with them, many, many jobs.
“I think the portrayal of me as having wild and crazy parties is absolutely incorrect,” Mr. Leder said during a wide-ranging interview in Sun Capital’s offices in Midtown Manhattan. “I spend a small percentage throwing some parties, attending some parties. I like music. I like to dance. But rather than reporting on how I spend 340 days and nights of my year, the media likes to report on the other 25.”
Paul Jones, chief executive of the Midwest retailer ShopKo, which Sun Capital acquired in 2005, said Mr. Leder has kept a close eye on his company. “I get e-mails from him, usually on Sunday mornings, in which he’s says we had an impressive week or sometimes it’s just to give our team an ‘attaboy,’ ” Mr. Jones said.
FOR more than 28 years, Helen Smolak worked at the Friendly’s in Denham, Mass. Day in and day out, she served Big Beef Burgers and Fribbles, collected tips and made a decent living.
All that changed one evening last October. That was when Ms. Smolak’s supervisor called to tell her the restaurant was shutting down — immediately.
“It was my family. That was my home,” said Ms. Smolak, 56. “Friendly’s always came first. I was supposed to retire with these people and with this company.”
What went wrong? Sun Capital acquired Friendly’s in 2007 for $395 million — an 8 percent premium based on Friendly’s stock price at the time. But now Sun was saying the weak economy and the rising prices of milk and other ingredients had pushed Friendly’s, a 76-year-old chain, to the brink.
The Pension Benefit Guaranty Corporation, the federal agency that helps safeguard corporate pensions, wasn’t so sure. It accused Sun Capital in bankruptcy court filings of using the bankruptcy to shift Friendly’s pension burden onto the agency.
“That’s absolutely not true,” Mr. Leder said. Friendly’s pension fund, he said, was underfunded well before Sun Capital bought the company. The outcome, he added, is simply the way the bankruptcy process works.
“We don’t make the rules,” he said with a shrug. He said the matter was settled with the agency for a “nominal” sum.
Bankruptcy is never pretty. But, in this case, Sun Capital was particularly adept at getting what it wanted. Only months after Friendly’s went bankrupt, Mr. Leder has already regained control of the company. It was a calculated move, and one that is potentially lucrative for Sun Capital and its investors. In filing for bankruptcy, Friendly’s also cut hundreds of jobs, closed dozens of restaurants and bought some time to regroup. Now, if Sun Capital can turn around Friendly’s, it might eventually be able to sell the chain at a profit.
And profit, after all, is what private equity is really about. Among the Sun Capital investors that stand to benefit from all of this are the New York State Teachers’ Retirement System, the Indiana State Teachers’ Retirement Fund and the Ford Foundation.
Jeffrey States is the investment officer for the Nebraska Investment Council, another Sun Capital investor. He said some private equity firms do provide information about how their dealings might affect things like jobs. But not all investors ask for such details.
“The primary objective is returns,” Mr. States said.
Mr. Leder, for his part, has never been shy about turning a profit. He and another banker, Rodger R. Krouse, were working at Lehman Brothers when they saw the huge money-making potential of private equity. They hatched their plan to get into the business one April afternoon in 1995, after a meeting at Mr. Romney’s Bain Capital in Boston.
The executives at Bain had been grousing about a deal in which Bain had doubled its money. But the Bain executives were lamenting that if they had sold sooner, they could have made much more.
On the plane back to New York, Mr. Leder and Mr. Krouse sat stunned.
“We’re looking at each other saying, ‘This is an industry where double your money is not that good of a deal?’ ” Mr. Leder recalls.
At 10 the next morning, Mr. Leder and Mr. Krouse marched into their bosses’ offices and quit. They then decided to base their new private equity firm in Boca Raton, and became its co-chief executives, believing the location would give them an edge in spotting potential acquisitions in the Southeast before their rivals in New York and Boston. But competitors kept outbidding them for companies.
It took 20 months, but they finally got their foot in the door. Friends and family members invested in their first dozen deals. Mr. Romney also invested personally in some early transactions, including an acquisition of a company that made speakers for computers and another that made carbon paper.
(Mr. Romney’s 2011 financial disclosures included stakes worth less than $15,000 apiece in two Sun-controlled companies — a pittance, given his estimated wealth of as much as $250 million. A spokeswoman for Mr. Romney’s campaign did not respond to an e-mail or a call seeking comment.)
Sun Capital soon carved a niche in doing turnarounds. In 1997, it acquired a majority stake in a maker of injection-molded polypropylene panels. By 2002, that company had more than doubled its sales.
One success led to another. Mr. Leder and Mr. Krouse invested $1.5 million in a company that supplied parts for Corvettes and walked away with $20 million. Two Sun investors were so tickled that they bought each man a red Corvette.
Such successes aside, Mr. Leder and Mr. Krouse make something of an odd couple. Mr. Krouse has the quiet demeanor of an accountant and tends to shift in his seat when conversations turn to his private life. (Former associates say he is a family man who likes to spend his spare time reading.)
Mr. Leder, by contrast, is bigger than life. He storms into a room and seems to suck out all of the air. Several former colleagues say he appears to have a photographic memory. He speaks rapidly and rarely holds back.
In a conversation about his business dealings, he segued into how his father wanted him to be a doctor but that he opted for other pursuits because he hated dissecting frogs in biology class. And he mentioned how he used crushed graham crackers as the secret ingredient in the pancakes he used to make for his youngest daughter.
He also said he started reading The Wall Street Journal when he was 12, and that in high school he delivered chickens and started a D. J. business. And he said that he typically sleeps for two to three hours at a time at night before waking up to answer e-mails.
AS word got out about Sun Capital’s early investment successes, pension funds and endowments were soon clamoring to get into its funds. Sun Capital raised fund after fund, each bigger than the last. In 2007, it raised $6 billion for a single fund. Sun Capital had hit the big time.
Then the Great Recession struck. The private equity boom turned bust fast.
By early 2009, numerous companies that Sun Capital had acquired were struggling to survive. Sun was racked by internal dissent. And Mr. Leder’s personal life had hit a rough patch.
By that spring, several Sun companies, including Drug Fair, Big 10 Tires and Mark IV Industries, had spiraled into bankruptcy. The firm had already taken losses on a large deal, a hostile takeover of the fashion company Kellwood, which Sun Capital had acquired without the usual due diligence.
Then came other, more personal blows. Mr. Leder and Mr. Krouse both lost money that they had personally invested with Bernard L. Madoff. Mr. Leder and his wife of 22 years, Lisa, began to go through a messy divorce. She demanded half of his total wealth, which she contended was more than $400 million at the time. The two eventually settled for an undisclosed amount.
Its business in retreat, Sun Capital laid off a number of its own employees. Those who stayed were told they would receive no cash bonuses. Instead, everyone was given a bigger slice of the portfolio of companies that, at that time, was losing value every day.
Angry employees fired off a list of dozens of pointed questions to Mr. Leder and Mr. Krouse, asking how much money the two co-founders had been paid and how much they had taken out of Sun Capital. The employees wanted to know how a firm that had just raised a $6 billion fund, and which was collecting about $120 million a year in management fees alone, could possibly be running low on cash.
Mr. Leder and Mr. Krouse had, in fact, already paid themselves handsomely for their giant fund. As 50-50 partners, they kept the first year’s fees, in cash, for themselves, according to former employees. A spokesman for Sun Capital declined to comment.
Mr. Leder said that even during its worst year, Sun Capital booked a small profit. He denied that his decisions were driven by his own financial interests. And Sun Capital paid its employees cash bonuses early for 2009 , he said, because “we realized we had pulled in the reins a little too hard.”
To critics who say that Sun Capital grew too big, too fast, Mr. Leder pointed to ShopKo, which it bought for $1.2 billion. Sun brought in new management, freshened up stores and plans to merge it with another Midwest retailer, Pamida. Sun Capital has already paid itself a dividend on that deal, and Mr. Leder says he expects it will generate big returns.
In a smaller deal, Sun Capital bought the Midwest retailer Gordmans for $56 million in 2008. It doubled its returns through two dividend payments and proceeds from the Gordmans initial public offering in 2010.
When asked if private equity could withstand the heat of election-year politics, Mr. Leder seems unfazed. He is among the top contributors to the political action committee Restore Our Future, a so-called super-PAC created to help Mr. Romney. He insists his business isn’t politics — it’s private equity.
“I don’t worry about what I can’t affect,” he said.
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The New York Post summed up the evening’s Dionysian mysteries with the following headline: “Nude Frolic in Tycoon’s Pool.”
The Post’s tycoon, and the party’s host, was a financier named Marc J. Leder, and those weekend revels last July had the East End of Long Island buzzing. Like many deal makers, though, Mr. Leder, 50, is virtually unknown outside financial circles. But from his headquarters in Boca Raton, Fla., he presides over a multibillion-dollar private empire. He is a practitioner of a Wall Street art that helped define an age of hyperwealth, and which has now been dragged into the white-hot spotlight of presidential politics: private equity.
It was through private equity that one Republican candidate, Mitt Romney, amassed his wealth — and, it turns out, it was through private equity that Mr. Romney first met Mr. Leder. A couple of months after the blowout in Bridgehampton, Mr. Leder was host for a fund-raiser at his Boca Raton home for Mr. Romney’s campaign. But the connection goes back even further. Years ago, a visit to Mr. Romney’s investment firm inspired Mr. Leder to get into private equity in the first place. Mr. Romney was an early investor in some of the deals done by Mr. Leder’s investment company, Sun Capital, which today oversees about $8 billion in equity.
Mr. Romney’s own time in the private equity business, at Bain Capital, has provoked fierce attacks from Republican rivals and others. It has also prompted a lot of questions, including the big one: What good is this business, anyway? Detractors say private equity has enriched a handful of financiers at the expense of ordinary Americans. The deal makers, this line goes, buy companies and then bleed the life out of them. Jobs are often among the casualties.
Whether there’s truth to such claims depends on whom you ask. Private equity executives, as well as Mr. Romney, who left Bain in 1999, say the industry fixes troubled companies and ultimately creates jobs. Whatever the case, three decades after this sort of deal-making burst onto the scene in the merger mania of the 1980s, there are surprisingly few solid answers from either side.
What is certain is that buyout specialists upended the old order and made vast fortunes for themselves. Fueled by easy money from banks, and from endowments and pension funds, these private investors were able to buy companies with borrowed money and put down relatively little of their own cash.
Today, many of these private kingdoms rival the nation’s mightiest public companies. In all, the private equity industry oversees $3 trillion in global assets, according to Preqin, the research firm. Buyout kings control more than 14,000 American companies, including brands like Hilton Hotels and Burger King.
BUT financiers weren’t the only ones to embrace private equity. On the campaign trail, Rick Perry called private equity artists “vulture capitalists.” But as governor of Texas, he blessed the largest corporate buyout in history — the $44.4 billion takeover of the utility TXU by several investment firms in 2007. Indeed, as in many other places nationwide, public pension funds in Texas used public money to bet on private equity, in hopes of generating the investment returns they needed to pay retirees.
Against this backdrop, the story of Marc Leder might seem a footnote in the nation’s economic ledger. But it is a story worth knowing. That’s because, in many ways, Mr. Leder personifies the debates now swirling around this lucrative corner of finance.
To his critics, he represents everything that’s wrong with this setup. In recent years, a large number of the companies that Sun Capital has acquired have run into serious trouble, eliminated jobs or both. Since 2008, some 25 of its companies — roughly one of every five it owns — have filed for bankruptcy.
Among the losers was Friendly’s, the restaurant chain known for its Jim Dandy sundaes and Fribble shakes. (Sun Capital was accused by a federal agency of pushing Friendly’s into bankruptcy last year to avoid paying pensions to the chain’s employees; Sun disputes that contention.) Another company that sank into bankruptcy was Real Mex, owner of the Chevy’s restaurant chain. In that case, Mr. Leder lost money for his investors not once, but twice.
Yet Mr. Leder doesn’t seem to be suffering too much himself. In fact, he is living so large that he can’t avoid the limelight. Last July, he used part of his personal fortune to join a group of investors in buying the Philadelphia 76ers. In December, he was spotted on St. Bart’s with Russell Simmons, of Def Jam and Phat Farm fame, and Rachel Zoe, the celebrity stylist. That again landed him in The New York Post, which dubbed him a “private equity party boy.”
Mr. Leder says that characterization couldn’t be further from the truth. He focuses on what are known as “scratch and dent” deals, which typically involve companies that are struggling to begin with. One-third of the companies Sun Capital has bought are losing money. It’s a tricky game in good times, and downright dangerous in bad ones. Mr. Leder and his defenders say Sun Capital has saved many companies and, with them, many, many jobs.
“I think the portrayal of me as having wild and crazy parties is absolutely incorrect,” Mr. Leder said during a wide-ranging interview in Sun Capital’s offices in Midtown Manhattan. “I spend a small percentage throwing some parties, attending some parties. I like music. I like to dance. But rather than reporting on how I spend 340 days and nights of my year, the media likes to report on the other 25.”
Paul Jones, chief executive of the Midwest retailer ShopKo, which Sun Capital acquired in 2005, said Mr. Leder has kept a close eye on his company. “I get e-mails from him, usually on Sunday mornings, in which he’s says we had an impressive week or sometimes it’s just to give our team an ‘attaboy,’ ” Mr. Jones said.
FOR more than 28 years, Helen Smolak worked at the Friendly’s in Denham, Mass. Day in and day out, she served Big Beef Burgers and Fribbles, collected tips and made a decent living.
All that changed one evening last October. That was when Ms. Smolak’s supervisor called to tell her the restaurant was shutting down — immediately.
“It was my family. That was my home,” said Ms. Smolak, 56. “Friendly’s always came first. I was supposed to retire with these people and with this company.”
What went wrong? Sun Capital acquired Friendly’s in 2007 for $395 million — an 8 percent premium based on Friendly’s stock price at the time. But now Sun was saying the weak economy and the rising prices of milk and other ingredients had pushed Friendly’s, a 76-year-old chain, to the brink.
The Pension Benefit Guaranty Corporation, the federal agency that helps safeguard corporate pensions, wasn’t so sure. It accused Sun Capital in bankruptcy court filings of using the bankruptcy to shift Friendly’s pension burden onto the agency.
“That’s absolutely not true,” Mr. Leder said. Friendly’s pension fund, he said, was underfunded well before Sun Capital bought the company. The outcome, he added, is simply the way the bankruptcy process works.
“We don’t make the rules,” he said with a shrug. He said the matter was settled with the agency for a “nominal” sum.
Bankruptcy is never pretty. But, in this case, Sun Capital was particularly adept at getting what it wanted. Only months after Friendly’s went bankrupt, Mr. Leder has already regained control of the company. It was a calculated move, and one that is potentially lucrative for Sun Capital and its investors. In filing for bankruptcy, Friendly’s also cut hundreds of jobs, closed dozens of restaurants and bought some time to regroup. Now, if Sun Capital can turn around Friendly’s, it might eventually be able to sell the chain at a profit.
And profit, after all, is what private equity is really about. Among the Sun Capital investors that stand to benefit from all of this are the New York State Teachers’ Retirement System, the Indiana State Teachers’ Retirement Fund and the Ford Foundation.
Jeffrey States is the investment officer for the Nebraska Investment Council, another Sun Capital investor. He said some private equity firms do provide information about how their dealings might affect things like jobs. But not all investors ask for such details.
“The primary objective is returns,” Mr. States said.
Mr. Leder, for his part, has never been shy about turning a profit. He and another banker, Rodger R. Krouse, were working at Lehman Brothers when they saw the huge money-making potential of private equity. They hatched their plan to get into the business one April afternoon in 1995, after a meeting at Mr. Romney’s Bain Capital in Boston.
The executives at Bain had been grousing about a deal in which Bain had doubled its money. But the Bain executives were lamenting that if they had sold sooner, they could have made much more.
On the plane back to New York, Mr. Leder and Mr. Krouse sat stunned.
“We’re looking at each other saying, ‘This is an industry where double your money is not that good of a deal?’ ” Mr. Leder recalls.
At 10 the next morning, Mr. Leder and Mr. Krouse marched into their bosses’ offices and quit. They then decided to base their new private equity firm in Boca Raton, and became its co-chief executives, believing the location would give them an edge in spotting potential acquisitions in the Southeast before their rivals in New York and Boston. But competitors kept outbidding them for companies.
It took 20 months, but they finally got their foot in the door. Friends and family members invested in their first dozen deals. Mr. Romney also invested personally in some early transactions, including an acquisition of a company that made speakers for computers and another that made carbon paper.
(Mr. Romney’s 2011 financial disclosures included stakes worth less than $15,000 apiece in two Sun-controlled companies — a pittance, given his estimated wealth of as much as $250 million. A spokeswoman for Mr. Romney’s campaign did not respond to an e-mail or a call seeking comment.)
Sun Capital soon carved a niche in doing turnarounds. In 1997, it acquired a majority stake in a maker of injection-molded polypropylene panels. By 2002, that company had more than doubled its sales.
One success led to another. Mr. Leder and Mr. Krouse invested $1.5 million in a company that supplied parts for Corvettes and walked away with $20 million. Two Sun investors were so tickled that they bought each man a red Corvette.
Such successes aside, Mr. Leder and Mr. Krouse make something of an odd couple. Mr. Krouse has the quiet demeanor of an accountant and tends to shift in his seat when conversations turn to his private life. (Former associates say he is a family man who likes to spend his spare time reading.)
Mr. Leder, by contrast, is bigger than life. He storms into a room and seems to suck out all of the air. Several former colleagues say he appears to have a photographic memory. He speaks rapidly and rarely holds back.
In a conversation about his business dealings, he segued into how his father wanted him to be a doctor but that he opted for other pursuits because he hated dissecting frogs in biology class. And he mentioned how he used crushed graham crackers as the secret ingredient in the pancakes he used to make for his youngest daughter.
He also said he started reading The Wall Street Journal when he was 12, and that in high school he delivered chickens and started a D. J. business. And he said that he typically sleeps for two to three hours at a time at night before waking up to answer e-mails.
AS word got out about Sun Capital’s early investment successes, pension funds and endowments were soon clamoring to get into its funds. Sun Capital raised fund after fund, each bigger than the last. In 2007, it raised $6 billion for a single fund. Sun Capital had hit the big time.
Then the Great Recession struck. The private equity boom turned bust fast.
By early 2009, numerous companies that Sun Capital had acquired were struggling to survive. Sun was racked by internal dissent. And Mr. Leder’s personal life had hit a rough patch.
By that spring, several Sun companies, including Drug Fair, Big 10 Tires and Mark IV Industries, had spiraled into bankruptcy. The firm had already taken losses on a large deal, a hostile takeover of the fashion company Kellwood, which Sun Capital had acquired without the usual due diligence.
Then came other, more personal blows. Mr. Leder and Mr. Krouse both lost money that they had personally invested with Bernard L. Madoff. Mr. Leder and his wife of 22 years, Lisa, began to go through a messy divorce. She demanded half of his total wealth, which she contended was more than $400 million at the time. The two eventually settled for an undisclosed amount.
Its business in retreat, Sun Capital laid off a number of its own employees. Those who stayed were told they would receive no cash bonuses. Instead, everyone was given a bigger slice of the portfolio of companies that, at that time, was losing value every day.
Angry employees fired off a list of dozens of pointed questions to Mr. Leder and Mr. Krouse, asking how much money the two co-founders had been paid and how much they had taken out of Sun Capital. The employees wanted to know how a firm that had just raised a $6 billion fund, and which was collecting about $120 million a year in management fees alone, could possibly be running low on cash.
Mr. Leder and Mr. Krouse had, in fact, already paid themselves handsomely for their giant fund. As 50-50 partners, they kept the first year’s fees, in cash, for themselves, according to former employees. A spokesman for Sun Capital declined to comment.
Mr. Leder said that even during its worst year, Sun Capital booked a small profit. He denied that his decisions were driven by his own financial interests. And Sun Capital paid its employees cash bonuses early for 2009 , he said, because “we realized we had pulled in the reins a little too hard.”
To critics who say that Sun Capital grew too big, too fast, Mr. Leder pointed to ShopKo, which it bought for $1.2 billion. Sun brought in new management, freshened up stores and plans to merge it with another Midwest retailer, Pamida. Sun Capital has already paid itself a dividend on that deal, and Mr. Leder says he expects it will generate big returns.
In a smaller deal, Sun Capital bought the Midwest retailer Gordmans for $56 million in 2008. It doubled its returns through two dividend payments and proceeds from the Gordmans initial public offering in 2010.
When asked if private equity could withstand the heat of election-year politics, Mr. Leder seems unfazed. He is among the top contributors to the political action committee Restore Our Future, a so-called super-PAC created to help Mr. Romney. He insists his business isn’t politics — it’s private equity.
“I don’t worry about what I can’t affect,” he said.
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2012年1月20日星期五
Q&A: Consumer watchdog spells out agency's tasks
A company’s obligations don’t stop with the law. It also needs to be fair and upfront with customers.
That’s the message from Richard Cordray, who was named by President Barack Obama as the first director of the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau.
“Frankly there’s a lot of fraud that’s committed in the marketplace that is not on its face necessarily technically illegal,” Cordray said in an interview with The Associated Press. Such practices will now be a target for the CFPB.
The agency and Cordray’s appointment are both controversial. The CFPB was created as part of the overhaul of the nation’s financial regulations, with a mandate to police the array of financial products marketed to consumers.
Republicans blocked Cordray’s appointment for months, saying the agency would have far too much power with too little accountability. Then earlier this month, Obama installed Cordray when Congress wasn’t in session.
With a director finally in place, the CFPB is moving quickly to flex its full authority in policing businesses such as mortgage brokers, student lenders and other businesses that previously escaped federal scrutiny.
On Thursday, the agency released a field guide for its examiners to analyze practices at payday lenders, which essentially offer customers advances on their paychecks for a flat fee. It will mark the first time the industry will be subject to such oversight.
The CFPB has started collecting public comment to help simplify the disclosures consumers receive with credit cards, mortgages and student financial aid. It will take months or even years before consumers see how these efforts play out.
But here’s what Cordray had to say about how the agency will impact consumers:
____
Q: A major focus for the CFPB has been on improving the transparency of a product’s fees and terms, and the disclosures consumers receive. Are there instances where this won’t be enough and more aggressive regulatory action will be required?
A: Let me answer that question in two parts. On transparency and disclosure; a key insight here is that more disclosures don’t always make things better. As it accumulates, there can be so much dense fine print that it can actually make things much worse _ consumers find it hard to penetrate and they often will not read it.
That’s a concern and that’s why we’re trying to make things more transparent, simpler and clearer with our “Know Before You Owe” project.
However, simply making things clearer to consumers is not enough if people aren’t actually playing by the rules and defrauding consumers. There we have to enforce the rules and we have to do it fairly, even handedly, but with rigor so that everybody understands that they have to follow and respect the law.
Q: Are there practices that are technically legal yet require regulatory action?
A: If something is technically legal, that’s one issue. But we also have the authority to determine that practices are unfair, deceptive and abusive. That’s where our authority can be used to try to protect consumers, even though maybe the technicalities of pre-existing laws have been followed.
So that’s something we’re going to have to be careful about _ the use of that authority. But it certainly is necessary to protect consumers and frankly there’s a lot of fraud that’s committed in the marketplace that is not on its face necessarily technically illegal. But when you see how a product is marketed, you can see what the effect is on consumers.
Q: So in those situations, what is the most important thing consumers need to know about what the CFPB can and cannot do?
A: Consumers should know that when they feel they’re being treated unfairly, they have the opportunity to come and tell us about it. And I mean the 300 million consumers all across this country _ they can come to our website at consumerfinance.gov. If it’s a mortgage or credit card issue, they can file a complaint with us.
If it’s any other kind of issue, we will be able to take those complaints eventually.
Q: Once those complaints are in hand, what are the limits of what the CFPB can do?
A: We have three different sets of authority that Congress gave us and that we are by law responsible to carry out. We have rule making authority. And we particularly are going to be active in trying to correct some of the problems in the mortgage markets over the next year or two.
We have supervision and examination authority, which is new but very important. It’s the ability to actually go into these institutions, look at their books and records and ask questions about what they do, and really get to the bottom of things. This means both working with them where that’s possible and or bringing enforcement actions where that’s necessary.
And the third is the ability to actually enforce the law _ which is clearly needed if you’re going to have a marketplace that actually works.
Q: One of the first industries the agency will be looking at is payday lending. A concern for consumer advocates is that customers often roll over the loans, meaning they repeatedly take out new loans to repay previous loans. What practices in the payday industry raise concerns for you?
A: One of the things we’re very concerned about is making sure that those products actually help consumers and don’t harm them. So the possibility that consumers end up rolling loans over and over, and end up in this sort of debt trap where they’re living off of money at 400 percent interest rates is a concern and it’s something we’re going to look at very closely.
Q: Suze Orman has a prepaid card and Amex last year rolled out a prepaid card. Do you see any risks with celebrities and major banks backing prepaid cards, or are there upsides?
A: We generally think consumers need to take care when they’re attracted to a product for reasons that might obscure the actual price and risk involved. People want think carefully about what they’re getting into here.
In the prepaid space in particular, there’s a lot of evolution and there are a lot of new products coming out. Some have appeared to be terrible products and some may be pretty good. We’re monitoring that and as I say, it’s a fast moving market right now and we’re going to consider carefully how to address those issues as they arise
Q: A lot of major banks have adopted this theme of transparency. Chase rolled out new checking account disclosures and Citi has its Simplicity credit card. How much faith do you have that the market can “right itself” in terms of transparency?
A: I have a lot of faith in the market if it is backed by evenhanded, comprehensive rules of the road that everyone knows they have to live by. If the market is left to its own devices or if we regulate part of the market and leave the rest unregulated, as happened with the mortgage market, that created, in my view, a lot of what caused the financial meltdown _ that’s never going to work.
It is our view that what we do will actually strengthen markets.
It’s quite possible that banks would have been moving to more transparency and simpler terms on their own. I happen to think some of that is in reaction to knowing that the consumer bureau is now in place, that it’s something we’re emphasizing.
Q: Student loans were a big issue during the Occupy protests and graduates are burdened with more and more debt. Do you see any parallels to the mortgage industry?
A: I’ve read a lot that suggests that student loans may be a bubble that is developing. Obviously the major driver of the total amount of student loans is the rapid increases in tuition and the costs of higher education in the last 10 years. We don’t control that.
What we can control and what we can affect is the choices that consumers make. That they know what their choices are, that they know the difference between federal loans and private student loans _ how that can affect terms of repayment, how that can affect the price and interest rate. These are important things for consumers to know.
We’re working right now with the Department of Education on an easy to navigate shopping sheet for students and their families.
Q: What role do school financial aid offices have in explaining the costs?
A: You have to examine the particular approach of an institution in context. You have to look at the facts and circumstances. So I wouldn’t make a blanket statement about all student loan offices, but obviously that’s an initial point of contact for the student and their families on the terms of what’s being offered. That needs to be done clearly and it needs to be done so that the student and their family can understand that choice.
It’s our belief that if consumers are presented with information in a clear and understandable fashion, they are the ones who will be able to make the best choices for themselves. It will never be for us to try and make these choices for anyone.
Q: Are companies changing their practices just because they know that the CFPB is out there?
A: I think that you are seeing change in these markets. I think you’re seeing it on three sides.
One side is you now have a bureau with some good tools to actually affect these markets in a constructive way.
On the business side, many of them are recognizing that they should get out in front of it. They’re trying to see what they can change on their own to either head off the enforcement or to try to improve things because they’re persuaded that it needs to be done.
The third side is consumers themselves. And it’s very important for consumers to recognize they have a lot of power in the market. Especially with social media, as they group together and it’s not just an isolated complaint but a group of people with a similar complaint. They can affect these businesses and how they respond to them
It’s important for consumers not only to look to the bureau for help but to look to themselves and help themselves.
___
Candice Choi can be reached at www.twitter.com/candicechoi
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That’s the message from Richard Cordray, who was named by President Barack Obama as the first director of the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau.
“Frankly there’s a lot of fraud that’s committed in the marketplace that is not on its face necessarily technically illegal,” Cordray said in an interview with The Associated Press. Such practices will now be a target for the CFPB.
The agency and Cordray’s appointment are both controversial. The CFPB was created as part of the overhaul of the nation’s financial regulations, with a mandate to police the array of financial products marketed to consumers.
Republicans blocked Cordray’s appointment for months, saying the agency would have far too much power with too little accountability. Then earlier this month, Obama installed Cordray when Congress wasn’t in session.
With a director finally in place, the CFPB is moving quickly to flex its full authority in policing businesses such as mortgage brokers, student lenders and other businesses that previously escaped federal scrutiny.
On Thursday, the agency released a field guide for its examiners to analyze practices at payday lenders, which essentially offer customers advances on their paychecks for a flat fee. It will mark the first time the industry will be subject to such oversight.
The CFPB has started collecting public comment to help simplify the disclosures consumers receive with credit cards, mortgages and student financial aid. It will take months or even years before consumers see how these efforts play out.
But here’s what Cordray had to say about how the agency will impact consumers:
____
Q: A major focus for the CFPB has been on improving the transparency of a product’s fees and terms, and the disclosures consumers receive. Are there instances where this won’t be enough and more aggressive regulatory action will be required?
A: Let me answer that question in two parts. On transparency and disclosure; a key insight here is that more disclosures don’t always make things better. As it accumulates, there can be so much dense fine print that it can actually make things much worse _ consumers find it hard to penetrate and they often will not read it.
That’s a concern and that’s why we’re trying to make things more transparent, simpler and clearer with our “Know Before You Owe” project.
However, simply making things clearer to consumers is not enough if people aren’t actually playing by the rules and defrauding consumers. There we have to enforce the rules and we have to do it fairly, even handedly, but with rigor so that everybody understands that they have to follow and respect the law.
Q: Are there practices that are technically legal yet require regulatory action?
A: If something is technically legal, that’s one issue. But we also have the authority to determine that practices are unfair, deceptive and abusive. That’s where our authority can be used to try to protect consumers, even though maybe the technicalities of pre-existing laws have been followed.
So that’s something we’re going to have to be careful about _ the use of that authority. But it certainly is necessary to protect consumers and frankly there’s a lot of fraud that’s committed in the marketplace that is not on its face necessarily technically illegal. But when you see how a product is marketed, you can see what the effect is on consumers.
Q: So in those situations, what is the most important thing consumers need to know about what the CFPB can and cannot do?
A: Consumers should know that when they feel they’re being treated unfairly, they have the opportunity to come and tell us about it. And I mean the 300 million consumers all across this country _ they can come to our website at consumerfinance.gov. If it’s a mortgage or credit card issue, they can file a complaint with us.
If it’s any other kind of issue, we will be able to take those complaints eventually.
Q: Once those complaints are in hand, what are the limits of what the CFPB can do?
A: We have three different sets of authority that Congress gave us and that we are by law responsible to carry out. We have rule making authority. And we particularly are going to be active in trying to correct some of the problems in the mortgage markets over the next year or two.
We have supervision and examination authority, which is new but very important. It’s the ability to actually go into these institutions, look at their books and records and ask questions about what they do, and really get to the bottom of things. This means both working with them where that’s possible and or bringing enforcement actions where that’s necessary.
And the third is the ability to actually enforce the law _ which is clearly needed if you’re going to have a marketplace that actually works.
Q: One of the first industries the agency will be looking at is payday lending. A concern for consumer advocates is that customers often roll over the loans, meaning they repeatedly take out new loans to repay previous loans. What practices in the payday industry raise concerns for you?
A: One of the things we’re very concerned about is making sure that those products actually help consumers and don’t harm them. So the possibility that consumers end up rolling loans over and over, and end up in this sort of debt trap where they’re living off of money at 400 percent interest rates is a concern and it’s something we’re going to look at very closely.
Q: Suze Orman has a prepaid card and Amex last year rolled out a prepaid card. Do you see any risks with celebrities and major banks backing prepaid cards, or are there upsides?
A: We generally think consumers need to take care when they’re attracted to a product for reasons that might obscure the actual price and risk involved. People want think carefully about what they’re getting into here.
In the prepaid space in particular, there’s a lot of evolution and there are a lot of new products coming out. Some have appeared to be terrible products and some may be pretty good. We’re monitoring that and as I say, it’s a fast moving market right now and we’re going to consider carefully how to address those issues as they arise
Q: A lot of major banks have adopted this theme of transparency. Chase rolled out new checking account disclosures and Citi has its Simplicity credit card. How much faith do you have that the market can “right itself” in terms of transparency?
A: I have a lot of faith in the market if it is backed by evenhanded, comprehensive rules of the road that everyone knows they have to live by. If the market is left to its own devices or if we regulate part of the market and leave the rest unregulated, as happened with the mortgage market, that created, in my view, a lot of what caused the financial meltdown _ that’s never going to work.
It is our view that what we do will actually strengthen markets.
It’s quite possible that banks would have been moving to more transparency and simpler terms on their own. I happen to think some of that is in reaction to knowing that the consumer bureau is now in place, that it’s something we’re emphasizing.
Q: Student loans were a big issue during the Occupy protests and graduates are burdened with more and more debt. Do you see any parallels to the mortgage industry?
A: I’ve read a lot that suggests that student loans may be a bubble that is developing. Obviously the major driver of the total amount of student loans is the rapid increases in tuition and the costs of higher education in the last 10 years. We don’t control that.
What we can control and what we can affect is the choices that consumers make. That they know what their choices are, that they know the difference between federal loans and private student loans _ how that can affect terms of repayment, how that can affect the price and interest rate. These are important things for consumers to know.
We’re working right now with the Department of Education on an easy to navigate shopping sheet for students and their families.
Q: What role do school financial aid offices have in explaining the costs?
A: You have to examine the particular approach of an institution in context. You have to look at the facts and circumstances. So I wouldn’t make a blanket statement about all student loan offices, but obviously that’s an initial point of contact for the student and their families on the terms of what’s being offered. That needs to be done clearly and it needs to be done so that the student and their family can understand that choice.
It’s our belief that if consumers are presented with information in a clear and understandable fashion, they are the ones who will be able to make the best choices for themselves. It will never be for us to try and make these choices for anyone.
Q: Are companies changing their practices just because they know that the CFPB is out there?
A: I think that you are seeing change in these markets. I think you’re seeing it on three sides.
One side is you now have a bureau with some good tools to actually affect these markets in a constructive way.
On the business side, many of them are recognizing that they should get out in front of it. They’re trying to see what they can change on their own to either head off the enforcement or to try to improve things because they’re persuaded that it needs to be done.
The third side is consumers themselves. And it’s very important for consumers to recognize they have a lot of power in the market. Especially with social media, as they group together and it’s not just an isolated complaint but a group of people with a similar complaint. They can affect these businesses and how they respond to them
It’s important for consumers not only to look to the bureau for help but to look to themselves and help themselves.
___
Candice Choi can be reached at www.twitter.com/candicechoi
http://tourism9.com/ http://vkins.com/
2012年1月19日星期四
The New Old Age Blog: Ask the Elder Law Attorney: Disclosures and Loans
Craig Reaves, past president of the National Academy of Elder Law Attorneys, practices elder law in Kansas City, Mo., and fields occasional questions from New Old Age readers. Submit yours to newoldage@nytimes.com. Please limit your queries to general legal issues, as Mr. Reaves cannot respond with individualized legal advice. Questions have been edited and condensed.
After my mother died in 2006, my father’s doctor said he shouldn’t be left alone. Apparently Mom had been covering for him. I’d visited seven weeks earlier and had not recognized how advanced his dementia had become.
Their will, stored in a safe, indicated that two of my sisters should manage things if both parents died. So the family — eight siblings in all — agreed that these two should have legal authority. They were added to financial accounts and given power of attorney. No one was in a position to care for my father, so he moved into a care facility, first in Florida, now in Michigan. He’s in relatively good health at age 80, cheerful on most days. He still knows me.
We siblings have had some squabbles regarding the sale of my parents’ house and other issues. Their estate was not large, probably under $350,000; given my father’s condition, it was always a concern whether he could pay for the care he needed.
I’ve requested, from both sisters who are managing things, some kind of statement as to exactly what Dad’s financial status is. These requests have fallen on deaf ears at times and been met with fury at other times. One sister, who’s slightly more forthcoming, recently told me that Dad has about 18 months of long-term care insurance coverage remaining. After that, he has enough money for probably another 18 months’ care.
Do I have any way to compel my sisters to share what I believe they already should have? Friends have warned that their secrecy in itself could mean unethical goings-on. I’m worried that in three years, they’ll ask me for a significant contribution — even greater than a one-eighth share, because some siblings can’t afford to help at all. That would present a wrenching quandary; I’ve accumulated much less myself than the $350,000 Dad started with. He may yet live a good long while, and I’d like to find a way to help my family avoid becoming more anxious about money as time goes on.
Gina
Phoenix
Unfortunately, this is not an unusual story. I strongly suggest that you contact an elder law attorney in the state where your father resides. Every state has its own statutes governing durable powers of attorney, and they can be very different. Whether an attorney-in-fact — meaning the person appointed by the power-of-attorney document to act on another’s behalf — has a duty to keep other heirs and siblings informed will depend on how the document is worded, the applicable state law and the facts of the situation.
Generally, though, the attorney-in-fact owes a fiduciary obligation to the principal (your father, in this case), not his heirs (the rest of the family). Unless the law or the document requires disclosure, an attorney-in-fact is usually not required to share any details with the heirs. She may even be prohibited from doing so.
There may be extenuating circumstances in this case, though, since all the children at one point apparently agreed to contribute time and effort to help their father. Moreover, I’m unsure what you mean when you say that your sisters were added to your father’s financial accounts. It may make a difference whether their names were only added as agents for your father or as joint owners of the accounts.
If directly approaching the attorneys-in-fact brings no satisfaction, and especially if you’re concerned that your sisters may be taking advantage of your father, you can petition the probate court in his county to appoint a guardian or conservator for him.
That not only will provide court oversight but will give you and your siblings access to your father’s financial information. And it will provide a forum in which you can air grievances about your father’s situation. The court will make sure that your father won’t be taken advantage of.
This can be an expensive solution, though, and it is probably a last resort. Perhaps the mere threat of going to court will convince your sisters to be more forthcoming about what they’re doing.
By the way, if your father runs out of money for his long-term care, he should qualify for Medicaid assistance. It generally won’t become his children’s responsibility to pay for his care themselves.
My ex-husband died five months after we divorced. My minor children are his sole heirs. All the accounts and assets were probated, and I was made legal representative. Now my ex-father-in-law is suing the estate for $2,800 in “loans” he made to his son when my ex’s business was slow in 2010.
What proof does he need to provide to demonstrate that this was not just a gift? He may just be trying to hurt me. I’m not sure he realizes, at age 85, that this money would be coming from his grandchildren, not from me.
Dawn
Davie, Fla.
The answer to this question will vary by state, so I suggest that you contact the lawyer who represented you in the probate or an elder law attorney in your community. But generally speaking, if the probate has closed and the decedent’s father knew of the probate, he should be barred from suing to collect on an alleged loan.
If the probate is still under way, the father can file a claim with the court. If the personal representative — that’s you — disputes this supposed loan, the court will schedule a hearing and your former father-in-law will have the burden of proving that this sum was a loan. Normally, that would require a promissory note signed by his son. If he can’t prove that this was a loan, then he can’t collect.
http://tourism9.com/ http://vkins.com/
After my mother died in 2006, my father’s doctor said he shouldn’t be left alone. Apparently Mom had been covering for him. I’d visited seven weeks earlier and had not recognized how advanced his dementia had become.
Their will, stored in a safe, indicated that two of my sisters should manage things if both parents died. So the family — eight siblings in all — agreed that these two should have legal authority. They were added to financial accounts and given power of attorney. No one was in a position to care for my father, so he moved into a care facility, first in Florida, now in Michigan. He’s in relatively good health at age 80, cheerful on most days. He still knows me.
We siblings have had some squabbles regarding the sale of my parents’ house and other issues. Their estate was not large, probably under $350,000; given my father’s condition, it was always a concern whether he could pay for the care he needed.
I’ve requested, from both sisters who are managing things, some kind of statement as to exactly what Dad’s financial status is. These requests have fallen on deaf ears at times and been met with fury at other times. One sister, who’s slightly more forthcoming, recently told me that Dad has about 18 months of long-term care insurance coverage remaining. After that, he has enough money for probably another 18 months’ care.
Do I have any way to compel my sisters to share what I believe they already should have? Friends have warned that their secrecy in itself could mean unethical goings-on. I’m worried that in three years, they’ll ask me for a significant contribution — even greater than a one-eighth share, because some siblings can’t afford to help at all. That would present a wrenching quandary; I’ve accumulated much less myself than the $350,000 Dad started with. He may yet live a good long while, and I’d like to find a way to help my family avoid becoming more anxious about money as time goes on.
Gina
Phoenix
Unfortunately, this is not an unusual story. I strongly suggest that you contact an elder law attorney in the state where your father resides. Every state has its own statutes governing durable powers of attorney, and they can be very different. Whether an attorney-in-fact — meaning the person appointed by the power-of-attorney document to act on another’s behalf — has a duty to keep other heirs and siblings informed will depend on how the document is worded, the applicable state law and the facts of the situation.
Generally, though, the attorney-in-fact owes a fiduciary obligation to the principal (your father, in this case), not his heirs (the rest of the family). Unless the law or the document requires disclosure, an attorney-in-fact is usually not required to share any details with the heirs. She may even be prohibited from doing so.
There may be extenuating circumstances in this case, though, since all the children at one point apparently agreed to contribute time and effort to help their father. Moreover, I’m unsure what you mean when you say that your sisters were added to your father’s financial accounts. It may make a difference whether their names were only added as agents for your father or as joint owners of the accounts.
If directly approaching the attorneys-in-fact brings no satisfaction, and especially if you’re concerned that your sisters may be taking advantage of your father, you can petition the probate court in his county to appoint a guardian or conservator for him.
That not only will provide court oversight but will give you and your siblings access to your father’s financial information. And it will provide a forum in which you can air grievances about your father’s situation. The court will make sure that your father won’t be taken advantage of.
This can be an expensive solution, though, and it is probably a last resort. Perhaps the mere threat of going to court will convince your sisters to be more forthcoming about what they’re doing.
By the way, if your father runs out of money for his long-term care, he should qualify for Medicaid assistance. It generally won’t become his children’s responsibility to pay for his care themselves.
My ex-husband died five months after we divorced. My minor children are his sole heirs. All the accounts and assets were probated, and I was made legal representative. Now my ex-father-in-law is suing the estate for $2,800 in “loans” he made to his son when my ex’s business was slow in 2010.
What proof does he need to provide to demonstrate that this was not just a gift? He may just be trying to hurt me. I’m not sure he realizes, at age 85, that this money would be coming from his grandchildren, not from me.
Dawn
Davie, Fla.
The answer to this question will vary by state, so I suggest that you contact the lawyer who represented you in the probate or an elder law attorney in your community. But generally speaking, if the probate has closed and the decedent’s father knew of the probate, he should be barred from suing to collect on an alleged loan.
If the probate is still under way, the father can file a claim with the court. If the personal representative — that’s you — disputes this supposed loan, the court will schedule a hearing and your former father-in-law will have the burden of proving that this sum was a loan. Normally, that would require a promissory note signed by his son. If he can’t prove that this was a loan, then he can’t collect.
http://tourism9.com/ http://vkins.com/
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