| Type | Public |
|---|---|
| Industry | Banking |
| Founded | 1929 |
| Defunct | 2009 |
| Successor | OneWest Bank |
| Headquarters | Los Angeles, California |
Key people | Babette Heimbuch, CEO |
| Revenue | $439 million |
Number of employees | 600 |
The First Federal Bank of California was a community bank founded in 1929, and encompassed most of Southern California. As of 2009, it operated approximately thirty-nine branches.
First Federal Bank, which offered both personal and business financial services, was a wholly owned subsidiary of First Fed Financial Corp. The banks financial goals were to retain superior quality, staying at the forefront of technology and focusing on organic growth and profitability.
On Friday, December 18, 2009, First Federal Bank of California, a Federal Savings Bank (First Federal Bank of California), Santa Monica, CA was closed by the Office of Thrift Supervision. Subsequently, the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation (FDIC) was named Receiver. All deposit accounts were transferred to OneWest Bank, FSB, Pasadena, CA. All 39 of its branches reopened as branches of OneWest.
First Federal Bank of California was founded in 1929 by William S. Mortensen, and later became an institution called First Federal Savings and Loan Association of Santa Monica.
In 1983, they diversified to offer full-service personal and business banking, including but notwithstanding wealth management and trust services. In 1987, they listed on the New York Stock Exchange as (symbol: FED). Subsequently, in 1989, they changed their name from First Federal Savings Bank to First Federal Bank of California to reflect the California marketplace.
On December 18, 2009, First Federal Bank of California was closed by the Office of Thrift Supervision. The assets and deposits of Federal Bank of California in Santa Monica were bought by closely held OneWest Bank. As of December 2010, the FDIC estimates the failure of First Federal Bank of California will cost the deposit insurance fund $10.0 million.
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The Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation (FDIC) is a United States government corporation supplying deposit insurance to depositors in American commercial banks and savings banks. The FDIC was created by the Banking Act of 1933, enacted during the Great Depression to restore trust in the American banking system. More than one-third of banks failed in the years before the FDIC's creation, and bank runs were common. The insurance limit was initially US$2,500 per ownership category, and this has been increased several times over the years. Since the enactment of the Dodd–Frank Wall Street Reform and Consumer Protection Act in 2010, the FDIC insures deposits in member banks up to $250,000 per ownership category. FDIC insurance is backed by the full faith and credit of the government of the United States, and according to the FDIC, "since its start in 1933 no depositor has ever lost a penny of FDIC-insured funds".
In the United States, banking began by the 1780s along with the country's founding and has developed into highly influential and complex system of banking and financial services. Anchored by New York City and Wall Street, it is centered on various financial services namely private banking, asset management, and deposit security.
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A savings and loan association (S&L), or thrift institution, is a financial institution that specializes in accepting savings deposits and making mortgage and other loans. The terms "S&L" or "thrift" are mainly used in the United States; similar institutions in the United Kingdom, Ireland and some Commonwealth countries include building societies and trustee savings banks. They are often mutually held, meaning that the depositors and borrowers are members with voting rights, and have the ability to direct the financial and managerial goals of the organization like the members of a credit union or the policyholders of a mutual insurance company. While it is possible for an S&L to be a joint-stock company, and even publicly traded, in such instances it is no longer truly a mutual association, and depositors and borrowers no longer have membership rights and managerial control. By law, thrifts can have no more than 20 percent of their lending in commercial loans—their focus on mortgage and consumer loans makes them particularly vulnerable to housing downturns such as the deep one the U.S. experienced in 2007.
The savings and loan crisis of the 1980s and 1990s was the failure of 32% of savings and loan associations (S&Ls) in the United States from 1986 to 1995. An S&L or "thrift" is a financial institution that accepts savings deposits and makes mortgage, car and other personal loans to individual members.
The Community Reinvestment Act is a United States federal law designed to encourage commercial banks and savings associations to help meet the needs of borrowers in all segments of their communities, including low- and moderate-income neighborhoods. Congress passed the Act in 1977 to reduce discriminatory credit practices against low-income neighborhoods, a practice known as redlining.
The Office of Thrift Supervision (OTS) was a United States federal agency under the Department of the Treasury that chartered, supervised, and regulated all federally chartered and state-chartered savings banks and savings and loans associations. It was created in 1989 as a renamed version of the Federal Home Loan Bank Board, another federal agency. Like other U.S. federal bank regulators, it was paid by the banks it regulated. The OTS was initially seen as an aggressive regulator, but was later lax. Declining revenues and staff led the OTS to market itself to companies as a lax regulator in order to get revenue.
An industrial loan company (ILC) or industrial bank is a financial institution in the United States that lends money, and may be owned by non-financial institutions. They provide niche financial services nationwide. ILCs offer FDIC-insured deposits and are subject to FDIC and state regulator oversight. All "FDIC-insured entities are subject to Sections 23A and 23B of the Federal Reserve Act, which limits bank transactions with affiliates, including the non-bank parent company." ILCs are permitted to have branches in multiple states. They are regulated and supervised by state charters and insured by the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation. They are authorized to make consumer and commercial loans and accept federally insured deposits. Banks may not accept demand deposits if the bank has total assets greater than $100 million. ILCs are exempted from the Bank Holding Company Act.
Great Western Bank was a large retail bank that operated primarily in the Western United States. Great Western's headquarters were in Chatsworth, California. At one time, Great Western was one of the largest savings and loan in the United States, second only to Home Savings of America. The bank was acquired by Washington Mutual in 1997 for $6.8 billion.
H.F. Ahmanson & Co. was a California holding company named after Howard F. Ahmanson Sr. It was best known as the parent of Home Savings of America, once one of the largest savings and loan associations in the United States.
United Commercial Bank was an overseas Chinese bank in the United States, based in San Francisco, California. It was a subsidiary of UCBH Holdings. Founded in 1974 as United Federal Savings and Loan Association, it changed its name to United Savings Bank, and finally United Commercial Bank in 1998. It had operations and branches located in the San Francisco Bay Area, Sacramento, Stockton, Los Angeles and Orange counties, New York, Boston, Greater Seattle Area, Hong Kong, Atlanta, Houston, Shanghai and two representative branches in Taipei, Taiwan and Shenzhen, China. United Commercial Bank was closed by regulators on November 6, 2009; it was the 120th U.S. bank to fail in 2009, and it had $11.2 billion in assets at the time of the bank failure. East West Bank of Pasadena, California, acquired all the deposits of UCBH.
The Financial Institutions Reform, Recovery, and Enforcement Act of 1989 (FIRREA), is a United States federal law enacted in the wake of the savings and loan crisis of the 1980s.
AmTrust Bank was a bank based in Cleveland, Ohio. The company was founded in 1889 and was closed in December 2009.
California National Bank was a consumer and business bank in the Southern California area.
IndyMac, a contraction of Independent National Mortgage Corporation, was an American bank based in California that failed in 2008 and was seized by the United States Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation (FDIC).
Bank regulation in the United States is highly fragmented compared with other G10 countries, where most countries have only one bank regulator. In the U.S., banking is regulated at both the federal and state level. Depending on the type of charter a banking organization has and on its organizational structure, it may be subject to numerous federal and state banking regulations. Apart from the bank regulatory agencies the U.S. maintains separate securities, commodities, and insurance regulatory agencies at the federal and state level, unlike Japan and the United Kingdom. Bank examiners are generally employed to supervise banks and to ensure compliance with regulations.
OneUnited Bank is an African-American-owned and managed Massachusetts-chartered trust company headquartered in Boston, Massachusetts. It is also registered by the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation (FDIC), and certified as a community development financial institution (CDFI) by the United States Department of Treasury. As of April 30, 2018, OneUnited Bank maintained $661.2 million in total assets.
Guaranty Bank was a major bank based in Austin, which collapsed in 2009. It was formed in 1988 as part of Temple-Inland and in 2007 became a standalone company. At the time of its collapse, Guaranty was the second largest bank in Texas, with 162 branches across Texas and California, and had $13 billion in assets and held $12 billion in deposits. Major shareholders included billionaire investor Carl Icahn and hotel tycoon Robert Rowling, who jointly invested $600 million in the bank in 2008.
Greater Atlantic Bank (GAB) was an American community bank. The bank was founded in May 1887 and was closed in December 2009. It was the first bank failure of the Great Recession and was the first bank failure in Virginia since 1993.
