Didn’t we just tell you this?
Posted on November 20, 2009 at 12:59 pmFor the second Friday in a row, Synovus Financial — the parent of The Bank of Nashville — has come out and told investors it has enough capital to weather the economic storm.
“While we do not believe our credit losses will reach the SCAP ‘More Adverse’ scenario levels, which would imply credit losses of almost $3.3 billion between January 1, 2009 and December 31, 2010, we believe that we have the capital and earnings capacity that would be needed under that scenario. We are pleased with our current core deposit trends as we continue to increase the core deposit funding percentage of our loan portfolio.”
SEE ALSO: Tom Brown says the stock can quintuple in two years.
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What the government will do when prime mortgages go foul
Posted on at 11:10 am
Analyst David Hendler of CreditSights sees more of what got us to today’s government-supported, not-really-healthy-at-all housing and banking sectors.
“[T]he prime residential mortgage crisis is probably going to require another massive government assistance program in that range of half a trillion [dollars] or more,” Hendler said. “And if this program is extended, it will lead to more bank regulatory restrictions with more capital and higher prudential liquidity levels. This would reduce the banks’ appetite and ability to take lending risks and put pressure on profitability.”
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Analyst action: Clarcor, CVS, SunTrust
Posted on at 10:42 amBB&T analyst Kevin Maczka on Thursday raised his rating on shares of Clarcor (Ticker: CLC) from ‘hold’ to ‘buy.’ His target price for the Franklin-based filtration and packaging company is $40, 27 percent above its Wednesday close.
Two stocks with a local presence have also received votes of confidence. At Credit Suisse, Craig Siegenthaler has lifted his target for SunTrust (Ticker: STI) to $23 from $21, while UBS analyst Neil Currie has started covering CVS Caremark (Ticker: CVS) with a ‘buy’ rating and a $34 target.
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Betsy Bean’s Regions’ November best
Posted on November 19, 2009 at 10:29 amLocally based Regions Bank Consumer Sales Manager Betsy Bean has been awarded the November Better Life Award by the bank for her dedication to the job.
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Hedge fund manager: Stick with BofA
Posted on at 10:03 am
John Paulson, the hedge fund guru who has hit several home runs during the current recession, has told his clients that Bank of America could double in the coming year and change.
The firm follows about 70 banks internationally and said the 139 percent gain in those stocks since the market’s March low “has resulted in inefficient valuations creating what we believe are opportunities” to benefit from rising and falling share prices.
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We’ll be rid of her soon
Posted on November 18, 2009 at 7:29 amMTSU officials say they began taking formal action on Pam Holder’s employment status “immediately” after the nursing professor was sentenced for her role in a mortgage fraud scheme.
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Ex-MTSU professor sentenced in mortgage fraud scheme
Posted on November 17, 2009 at 7:24 am
Pam Holder, a former Tennessee Board of Regents official and professor of nursing at MTSU, has been sentenenced to 366 days in jail for her part in a mortgage fraud scheme that used straw buyers.
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Pinnacle, America Service big gainers
Posted on November 16, 2009 at 1:13 pm
A good number of Middle Tennessee’s public companies are on track to gain about 3 percent today, but two names are outpacing them and the broader market. Shares of Pinnacle Financial Partners (Ticker: PNFP) are up some 7 percent while America Service (Ticker: ASGR) is 5.5 percent higher. Both stocks are now at their highest levels in about two weeks.
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First Tennessee still sees plenty of local opportunity
Posted on at 10:02 amIn an update of its analyst packet, First Horizon says its retail branch network in Middle Tennessee has the potential to grow big time, pointing to the lower deposit levels at its new branches. Getting the 25 office built since 2003 up to snuff would lift First Tennessee’s local deposits by more than $700 million. (In the most recent FDIC snapshot, First Tennessee checked with $1.6 billion in deposits, slipping to sixth in Nashville-area deposit market share.)
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‘The perfect scenario for our dear friends, the vulture funds’
Posted on at 9:40 am
Prism Hotels & Resorts CEO Steve Van sees regulators’ extend-and-pretend policies producing only one outcome — “and hotel loans are the lead cow.”
Smart money will wait at the end of the canyon and have a historic feast of cheap hotel asset buys. Most of us will just keep our heads down and try to do the best we can as owners holding on to our hotels or as lenders working out loans.
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False alarm at Synovus
Posted on at 7:38 amThe parent of The Bank of Nashville says its capital levels are still where the regulators want them.
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At the FHA, it’s a case of ‘On the one hand…’
Posted on November 13, 2009 at 7:18 amThe bad news: The reserves at the Federal Housing Administration, which insures lenders against mortgage losses, are running below their mandated levels.
The encouraging news: More recent mortgages under the FHA umbrella are showing dramatically lower delinquency rates.
FHA’s recent books-of-business continue to experience elevated levels of stress due to house price declines, income loss and climbing unemployment, according to HUD’s report. For example, the ‘08 year of single-family insurance — representing 15.7% of total insurance — saw a 12.13% seriously delinquent rate as of the latest actuarial study. But the ‘07 year of insurance — representing only 5.7% of total insurance — saw an 18.53% serious delinquency rate.
The ‘09 year of insurance performed relatively well as of the most recent data, experiencing only 1.6% serious delinquencies although the loans insured in fiscal year 2009 account for more than 31% of all loans insured by FHA.
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Analyst action: CVS Caremark, Synovus
Posted on November 11, 2009 at 10:43 amScott Mushkin at Jefferies has lowered his price target on shares of CVS Caremark (Ticker: CVS) to $39 from $42 after the company’s so-so earnings call last week. He still rates the stock a ‘buy.’
Over at Morgan Keegan, Robet Patten has cut his rating on Synovus Financial to ‘market perform’ from ‘outperform.’ Shares of Synovus (Ticker: SNV) have lost three-quarters of their value this year.
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Dispatches from the changing mortgage market
Posted on at 7:59 am
Here are two tidbits that crystallize the state of today’s mortgage world, a segment of the financial spectrum that has arguably seen more gut-wrenching, roller-coasting change than any other in the past few years. First, there’s the national headline that JPMorgan Chase plans to hire 1,200 loan officers in the next 13 months. The megabank has been among those profiting mightily from the flight to quality and capital.
On a more local scale, three-year-old Farmington Financial Group recently announced it has completed its metamorphosis from broker to funder. For founder and President Hart Weatherford, pictured above, the move is in part about “returning to time-honored lending traditions when bankers knew and respected their customers as individuals and worked diligently to earn their financial trust.”
SEE ALSO: Building anew and JPMorgan’s mortgage warning
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A headwind, not a show stopper
Posted on November 10, 2009 at 12:48 pmAtlanta Federal Reserve President Dennis Lockhart says commercial real estate’s slump will last as long as job creation limps along. But he doesn’t see the sector causing another downturn, though its struggles will affect small-business lending.
Unlike residential real estate, there is not the same direct linkage from CRE to household wealth - and therefore consumption - caused by erosion of home equity. However, there could be an impact resulting from small banks’ impaired ability to support the small business sector - a sector I expect will be critically important to job creation.
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