Banks Vie for Lucrative Prize: Chinese in U.S.
Competition Is Driving Takeovers
To Serve a Growing Demographic;
Megabanks Loom as a Threat
Threatened by slowing growth and mounting competition, several small banks catering to the rapidly increasing Chinese population in the U.S. are battling for coast-to-coast supremacy in that highly profitable niche.
Following the lead of expansion-hungry mainstream banks, the three largest Chinese-focused banks in the nation have bought or agreed to acquire five commercial banks during the past year. In all, they have spent $1.34 billion on 11 takeovers since early 2003. Analysts see the trend continuing.
UCBH Holdings Inc. of San Francisco, the nation's third-largest Chinese-focused bank by stock-market value, at $1.66 billion, last month announced the purchase of Atlanta-based Summit Bank Corp. Summit, with branches in Atlanta, San Francisco and Houston, specializes in commercial loans to small and midsize businesses. The $175.5 million deal is the second-largest for UCBH, which made acquisitions last year in Boston and Seattle.
The Summit deal follows a bidding war that erupted last fall for Great Eastern Bank, the biggest bank targeting Chinese consumers and businesses in New York City. Cathay General Bancorp, based in Los Angeles, struck first by securing options to buy a 41% stake that valued the entire company at about $69 million. Great Eastern sought other buyers, agreeing to a deal with UCBH. But Cathay won the battle in April with a $101 million offer.
"One of our key strategies is to serve Chinese businesses in major cities in the U.S.," says Heng Chen, finance chief at Cathay, which was started in a storefront office in the Chinatown section of Los Angeles in 1962 and now has a market value of $1.85 billion. In July, Cathay agreed to buy New Asia Bancorp for $23.5 million to enter Chicago.
The takeovers are fueled by many of the same pressures squeezing regional banks. The real-estate slowdown is putting the brakes on loan growth, and the shrinking difference between yields of long- and short-term bonds continues to crimp net interest income.
Like big acquirers, Chinese-focused banks want to attract new customers and offer more services to existing ones, while adding scale to become more cost-efficient. Meanwhile, analysts say, smaller ethnic banks are feeling increasingly burdened by the cost of complying with regulations, such as those designed to thwart money laundering.
About 80 banks largely target Asian consumers and businesses or are majority-owned by Asians, according to the Federal Deposit Insurance Corp. Some attractive markets such as Chicago and Houston haven't been "picked over" yet, says Campbell Chaney, an analyst at Sanders Morris Harris Inc. In metropolitan New York, No. 1 in the number of Chinese-owned businesses, potential targets include Chinese American Bank and United Orient Bank, each with a presence in Chinatown.
The activity partly reflects the nation's expanding Chinese population, which was about 2.9 million in 2005, a 21% increase since 2000, according to the U.S. Census Bureau. The overall U.S. population rose 5% in the same period.
The strongest ethnic Chinese banks cater obsessively to their customers. Many Chinese consumers are diligent savers and prefer to have written documents showing their account balances, so the specialized banks typically offer savings-account passbooks, which many big banks stopped doing years ago.
Chinese-focused banks also are often willing to lend to immigrants lacking a traditional credit history. UCBH will consider an applicant's savings and bill-payment record.
"It works," says Thomas Wu, UCBH's 48-year-old chairman and chief executive officer, who was initially unable to get a mortgage after moving to the U.S. in 1991 even though he had worked previously at four other banks. Last year, UCBH charged off a scant 0.03% of its loans.
While some of the world's biggest banks, including Bank of America Corp. and Royal Bank of Scotland PLC, have spent billions of dollars buying small stakes in China's biggest lenders, small Chinese banks in the U.S. generally are limiting bets to one or two offices in China that deal mostly with existing U.S. customers.
"We pride ourselves on being a financial bridge," says Dominic Ng, chairman and CEO of East West Bancorp Inc. of Pasadena, Calif., the nation's largest ethnic Chinese bank, with a market value of $2.3 billion. UCBH hopes to buy a bank in mainland China to expand its trade-finance business.
The formula is starting to show signs of stress. Combined profit growth of 18% at East West, Cathay and UCBH in the first half of 2006 trounced the industry overall but puts the three leading Chinese-focused banks on track to fall short of their 29% average annual earnings growth since 2001. Summit, the bank UCBH is buying, reported a 16% first-half profit rise through June 30, but balance-sheet growth has been "lackluster," says Joe Morford, an analyst at RBC Capital Markets. UCBH is paying a 52% premium over Summit's pre-takeover share price.
Among the biggest threats facing Chinese-focused banks are megabanks that have deeper lending and investment-banking services, many more branches and growing interest in the sector. Bank of America, based in Charlotte, N.C., with 140 branches in Chinese communities in California, recently began mailing calendars to some Chinese customers to mark the Chinese New Year, a spokesman says.
Last month, Wells Fargo & Co., of San Francisco, the nation's fourth-largest bank by market value, opened a branch in the Oakland, Calif., Chinatown with specially themed art, fabric and colors, plus Chinese-language signs and Chinese-speaking employees. All 6,500 Wells Fargo automated-teller machines offer Chinese as an language option, and the bank has made $1.9 billion in loans to Asian business owners since 2002, approaching a target of $3 billion in 10 years.
"We try to be where they are," says Tzu-Chen Lee, Wells Fargo senior vice president in charge of the Asian segment.
美国华人业务银行整合势头加剧
在业务增速放缓和竞争加剧的威胁下，主要以美国迅速增长的华裔人口为服务对象的几家小银行正在展开激烈的争斗，它们都想坐上这一高利润细分市场的头把交椅。
以如饥似渴进行业务扩张的美国主流银行为榜样，美国主做华人业务的银行中规模最大的3家在过去1年中共达成了5宗商业银行并购交易，其中一些已经完成。而自2003年初以来，它们进行的并购交易总计已达11宗，涉及金额13.4亿美元。分析师们预计这一趋势还将持续下去。
美国华人业务银行中股票市值居第三位的联合银行控股公司(UCBH Holdings Inc.)上个月宣布，将收购亚特兰大的瑞丰银行(Summit Bank Corp.)，后者在亚特兰大、旧金山和休斯顿有分支机构，专门从事向中、小型企业发放商业贷款的业务。对于市值达16.6亿美元的联合银行控股公司来说，这是它有史以来规模第二大的并购交易，该公司去年还在波士顿和西雅图进行过收购。
在收购瑞丰银行之前，联合银行控股去年秋季还参与了一场竞购纽约市华人业务银行冠东银行(Great Eastern Bank)的大战。本来洛杉矶的国泰万通控股公司(Cathay General Bancorp)已先行获得了收购冠东银行41%股份的选择权，根据协议规定的收购价冠东银行的身价将达6,900万美元左右。冠东银行后来在寻找其他买家的过程中又与联合银行控股达成了收购协议。但国泰万通控股最终还是凭借其高达1.01亿美元的出价在今年4月赢得了这场竞购。
国泰万通控股的财务长陈维恒(Heng Chen)说：“我们的重要战略之一是为美国各大城市的华人企业提供服务。”该公司1962年创办于洛杉矶的唐人街，目前市值已达18.5亿美元。今年7月，国泰万通控股达成了斥资2,350万美元收购新亚银行股份有限公司(New Asia Bancorp)的协议，从而得以将业务扩展到了芝加哥。
推动这些收购的同样是那些困扰着美国地区性银行的诸多压力。房地产市场的降温导致贷款增速减缓，而长期和短期债券收益率的差额不断收窄则在持续压缩着这些银行的利息净利润。与美国主流银行一样，华人业务银行实施收购的目的也是为了吸引新客户、增加对现有客户的服务以及通过扩大规模来降低单位成本。与此同时，美国主要为单一族群服务的银行中那些规模较小者则正承受着越来越大的成本压力，政府出于反洗钱等目的出台的监管法规使银行业的经营成本不断加重。
美国联邦存款保险公司(Federal Deposit Insurance Corp.)提供的数据显示，美国大约有80家银行或是主要以亚裔美国人及其所创办企业为服务对象或是主要由亚裔人士所拥有。Sanders Morris Harris Inc.的分析师坎贝尔?钱尼(Campbell Chaney)说，这类银行在芝加哥和休斯顿等有吸引力的市场尚未完成优胜劣汰。而在华人企业数量位居全美第一的纽约市，潜在的被收购目标有中美银行(Chinese American Bank)和东方银行(United Orient Bank)等，它们在唐人街都有营业网点。
美国华人业务银行间的活跃并购一定程度上反映了美国华裔人口的不断增长。美国人口普查局的数字显示，美国截至2005年的华裔人口约为290万，比2000年时增加了21%。而美国的总人口在此期间只增长了5%。
那些实力最强的华人业务银行在为客户服务方面可谓不遗余力。美国许多华人都喜欢存钱，而且他们都希望银行能提供打印出来的存单，所以这些专做华人业务的银行通常都会向储户提供存折，而美国许多大银行多年前就不这样做了。华人业务银行还经常乐于向缺乏信用纪录的移民提供贷款。联合银行在向申请人提供贷款时会参考其储蓄情况以及付帐纪录。
联合银行控股公司48岁的主席兼总裁胡少杰(Thomas Wu)说：“这就足够了。”他本人在1991年移民美国后的最初一段时间无法从银行获得按揭贷款，尽管他在申请贷款时已先后在4家银行工作过。联合银行去年的不良贷款率仅为0.03%。
虽然包括美国银行(Bank of America Corp.)和皇家苏格兰银行(Royal Bank of Scotland PLC)在内的一些世界顶级银行纷纷斥资数十亿美元以求成为中国几大国有银行的小股东，但美国的华人业务银行却普遍只限于在中国开设一两家办事处，而且这些办事处也主要与银行的现有美国客户打交道。
美国最大华人业务银行华美银行集团(East West Bancorp Inc.)的董事长兼首席执行长吴建民(Dominic Ng)说：“我们为自己能够成为一座金融桥梁感到骄傲。”华美银行集团的市值达23亿美元。联合银行控股公司希望能在中国大陆收购一家银行，以扩展其贸易融资业务。
但专做华人生意这种业务模式已开始显现后劲不足的迹象。今年上半年华美银行集团、国泰万通控股公司和联合银行控股公司三家的利润共增长了18%，虽然比美国银行业的总体利润增幅要高许多，但比起这美国三大华人业务银行2001年以来平均达29%的利润年增长率来就逊色了。而联合银行控股正准备收购的瑞丰银行宣布，在截至6月30日的上半年，其利润增长了16%，但RBC Capital Markets的分析师乔?莫福特(Joe Morford)则说，该行的资产增长速度一直不理想。联合银行控股给瑞丰银行开出的收购价比后者在收购协议签署前的股价高52%。
这些华人业务银行面临的最大威胁之一是来自美国大型银行的竞争。后者提供贷款和投资银行服务的能力更强，营业网点要多得多，而且它们对华人客户的兴趣正与日俱增。美国银行在加州的华人社区拥有140个营业网点，该行一位发言人说，美国银行最近已开始向一些华人客户邮寄恭贺农历新年的挂历。
美国市值第四大的富国银行(Wells Fargo & Co.)上个月在奥克兰的中国城开设了一家分支机构，它的店面装饰具有中国风格，除了有中文标牌外还配有能讲中文的职员。富国银行的6,500台自动取款机都有中文提示语言，自2002年以来该行已向亚裔企业主发放了19亿美元贷款，目前它正向10年内发放30亿美元这类贷款的目标迈进。
富国银行负责亚裔业务的高级副总裁Tzu-Chen Lee说，该行正努力把这一业务开展到亚裔客户所在的每一个地方。
Ann Carrns
