Anaheim Startup Bank Hits $100M
By ANDREW SIMONS
Premier Commercial Bank is following a familiar pattern among Orange County’s homegrown banks: rapid asset growth.
The Anaheim bank has doubled its assets in the past year to $100 million and projects to grow them by another 50% this year, according to Chief Executive Kenneth Cosgrove.
That puts Premier Commercial near the top five of OC-based banks, based on the Business Journal’s October list.
“I would say we are substantially over our original plan,” Cosgrove said. “We were projected to be around $55 million at the conclusion of our second year.”
Premier’s growth has come in part from its work with hotels and other businesses around the Disneyland Resort, Cosgrove said. Commercial real estate and business loans also have helped, he said.
Like other OC business banks, Premier has started doing Small Business Administration lending. With interest income at a low, Premier and others have turned to SBA lending as a way to bring in more revenue.
Assets at OC banks have been surging as money has flowed out of the stock market and into banks and real estate. OC’s largest homegrown commercial banks grew assets by about 36% through most of 2002.
OC has had several banks start up in recent years to go after customers unhappy with consolidation at the big banks. The upstarts have had a good time raising money.
Commercial Bank of California, which opened in the old Costa Mesa office of Imperial Bank in May, closed a $27 million offering this year.
Among that bank’s backers: William Lyon, chief executive of Newport Beach-based William Lyon Homes Inc., and Paul Folino, chief executive of Emulex Corp. of Costa Mesa.
Another, Buena Park-based Uniti Bank Corp., plans to close a second round totaling $6 million this year.
Commercial Bank’s offering,along with Uniti’s and others in OC,make this a record year for bank offerings. The earlier record was 1999, when four startup banks raised $30 million.
The trend for upstart banks in OC is to grow assets and then be bought.
The upstarts still face competition. Both Wells Fargo & Co. and Bank of America Corp. are targeting small businesses. Other regional banks, such as California Bank & Trust, part of Utah’s Zions Bancorp, also are courting small and midsize businesses through traditional and SBA loans.
Another sources of competition: brokerage houses.
“We continue to see competition from nonbanks,” Cosgrove said. “Brokerage firms have expanded into commercial lending.”
