And another one's gone, another one's gone, another Bank bites the dust.......

[marmar]

via the NY Times:



Real Estate Lender Is 10th Bank to Fail This Year
By THE ASSOCIATED PRESS
Published: August 29, 2008


Integrity Bank of Alpharetta, Ga., on Friday became the 10th United States bank to fail so far this year, hurt by the very business it was built on — real estate lending.

Regions Bank of Birmingham, Ala., is assuming all of Integrity Bank’s $974 million in insured and uninsured deposits in 23,000 accounts, and about $34.4 million of the bank’s $1.1 billion in assets.

The remainder of Integrity’s assets are being retained by the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation. The agency said it estimated that Integrity’s failure would cost its deposit insurance fund $250 million to $350 million.

Integrity Bank, which opened for business in November 2000, specialized in real estate lending in the Atlanta area with a self-described “faith-based culture.” Throughout the early part of the decade when the housing market was booming, Integrity Bank grew into a billion-dollar publicly traded company — but when the real estate market started faltering, the bank struggled.

A F.D.I.C. spokesman, Rickey McCullough, said late Friday that the bank had failed because of its aggressive pursuit of construction loans, coupled with falling real estate values and “inadequate risk management.” .......(more)

The complete piece is at: http://www.nytimes.com/2008/08/30/business/30fail.html?ref=business

[progressive_realist]

1. A "faith-based culture"

With "inadequate risk management"? Kind of speaks for itself, doesn't it?