A group of investors is forming a bank in San Juan Capistrano with a focus on doctors.
Backers of the proposed Capital Bank are seeking to raise $15 million to $18 million through the initial sale of 1.5 million to 1.8 million shares, according to filings with the state’s Department of Financial Institutions and the Federal Deposit Insurance Corp.
The startup is seeking regulatory approval to issue up to 30 million shares in all. Irvine-based banking consultancy Carpenter & Co. is handling the application.
Capital Bank’s backers see doctors as underserved by existing banks, leading them to fill their proposed board with prominent doctors and surgeons.
Officials with Capital Bank could not be reached for comment.
The bank plans to offer small-business loans, mortgages and other services in South County.
J. Michael Justice Jr., a 44-year-old Oceanside resident, is set to be Capital Bank’s chief executive.
Justice counts a long banking career in the San Diego area. He most recently was chief financial officer of San Diego Trust Bank, joining the bank during its 2003 formation.
Before that, he was executive vice president and chief administrative officer of Rancho Santa Fe-based First Community Bancorp following its 2001 acquisition of Capital Bank of North County of Carlsbad.
Capital Bank’s application indicates that the bank hopes to serve a nine-city swath along the San Diego (I-5) Freeway in southern OC.
Cities there include Laguna Woods, Lake Forest, Aliso Viejo, Laguna Hills, Mission Viejo, Laguna Niguel, Dana Point, San Juan Capistrano and San Clemente.
This summer, another bank filed plans with state regulators to start doing business in South County. Access Business Bank also wants to raise $18 million, according to Tom Byington, chief executive of the proposed bank, which would be based in the Irvine Spectrum.
This past year has seen a flurry of business banks form.
These include Fortis Business Bank in Santa Ana, which is going after the county’s growing Hispanic population; Friendly Hills Bank, which opened along Whittier Boulevard in Whittier at the county line; and US Metro, a Korean-American bank in Garden Grove.
Another, Irvine-based Pacific Business Bank Inc., which has plans to raise $28 million, hopes to open by December.
Since mid-2005, two banks were started in Westminster to serve the city’s Vietnamese-American community: Saigon National Bank and First Vietnamese America Bank.
And earlier this summer, a cadre of former Mellon 1st Business Bank senior executives with strong ties to OC jumped ship to form their own business bank, called 1st Enterprise Bank. Roughly half of the Los Angeles-based bank’s board members and founding investors come from here. The bank is expected to go after business in OC.
Capital Bank board members include:
B. Ted Field of Orange, an orthopedic surgeon and the bank’s proposed chairman.
James A. Heinrich, a Laguna Niguel surgeon specializing in facial plastic and reconstructive surgery and founder of the Pacific Coast Cosmetic & Laser Medical Center Inc.
Hassan Safieddine of Fountain Valley, whose family operates as ABCO Group Inc. and owns a medical services company in Newport Beach as well as other Southern California businesses.
Dallas surgeon Jack E. Zigler.
Senior officials include John R. McGill, the proposed chief operating officer, who has held commercial banking and business development jobs with banks in San Diego and OC; and Richard L. Burd, 75, the proposed chief financial officer, who has had banking jobs during the past five decades in the area.
