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A judge in New Jersey limited Spencer Savings Bank's ability to control the process for director nominations.
March 21 -
Banks in general are paying departing executives less money. But some, including Sterling Bancorp in New York, are still approving multimillion-dollar parachutes.
September 4 -
Two dozen former mutual thrifts, including OmniAmerican, have reached or are nearing the end of a three-year ban from selling themselves. Let the M&A chatter begin.
January 23 -
Center Bancorp Inc. in Union, N.J., has denied an activist shareholder's request to join its board.
September 25 -
Clifton Savings Bancorp Inc. in New Jersey said that three of the four claims of corporate waste brought against it in 2004 by the activist shareholder Lawrence Seidman have been dismissed.
November 7
Activist investor Lawrence Seidman is pressuring OBA Financial Services (OBAF) in Germantown, Md., to find a buyer.
Seidman based his assertion that a sale is necessary on the $382 million-asset company's poor asset growth, lagging efficiency and "abysmal" returns on average assets and average equity. "I believe that a sale to a strategic buyer, because of [OBA Financial's poor financial performance, is the only way for the
shareholders to maximize the value of their investment," Seidman wrote in a
Seidman, who controls nearly 7% of the company's common stock, is known for pressuring publicly traded companies to change managers or pursue sales. His
OBA Financial earned nearly $700,000 in the first half of this year. Its return on equity was 1.48% at June 30; its return on assets was 0.24%.
The company's stock closed at $18.73 a share on Monday, compared to its debut at $10 in January 2010.
"In my opinion, there is no legitimate correlation between [the company's] financial performance and its share price," Seidman wrote in his letter. OBA Financial "went public at approximately 60% of tangible book value and rose to approximately tangible book value solely because the majority of the shareholders, who purchased the stock, expected a sale at a premium to its tangible book value shortly after the three-year regulatory sale prohibition expired" last January.
