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| Recent mortgage-industry corporate activity includes approval by stockholders of a U.S. mortgage company to be acquired by a foreign bank.
In Las Vegas, Nev., Millenium Holding Group Inc. announced that it will purchase Nevada Mortgage Co., which specializes in first and second mortgages, as well as land, construction and commercial loans. “This acquisition is an incremental step to our strategic objective of integrating the three financial disciplines of banking, insurance and securities,” said Richard Ham, Millenium chief executive and president, in the announcement. “This is a quality acquisition in the financial area of lending.” Nevada Mortgage employees will remain intact, according to the announcement. In Westbury, N.Y., New York Community Bancorp Inc. recently announced it will buy Atlantic Bank of New York from the National Bank of Greece in a $400 million all-cash transaction expected to close in the first quarter 2006. Atlantic reportedly is a Manhattan-based full-service commercial bank with other locations in Queens, Brooklyn, Long Island, and Westchester County. Upon completion of the transaction, Atlantic will operate as a division of New York Commercial Bank, the commercial bank subsidiary of New York Community that will be established in connection with the acquisition of Long Island Financial Corp. expected to occur this quarter. “In addition to supporting our strategic focus on growing commercial deposits and services, the transaction with Atlantic will give us a presence in Manhattan, while enhancing our commercial bank presence throughout our marketplace,” said New York Community President and CEO Joseph Ficalora in the statement. New York Community said its interest rate risk profile and net interest margin will improve with the acquisition by replacing wholesale funding with low-cost core deposits. On Friday, E-Loan stockholders approved the merger with Popular Inc., according to an announcement. The $300-million deal for Popular, a Puerto Rican bank with U.S. operations, to acquire the California-based online lender was disclosed in August and remains subject to other customary closing conditions. It was previously announced that this quarter would hold the closing of the transaction, which Popular said will complement its existing nonprime and warehouse lending businesses, and significantly enhance its technology platform. Popular announced last month it would acquire New Jersey-based Infinity Mortgage Corp. |
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Coco Salazar is an assistant editor and staff writer for MortgageDaily.com.E-mail: s3celeste@aol.com |
