A well-known digital bank could be back on the block

BankMobile could be up for sale again.

Customers Bancorp in Wyomissing, Pa., said it is weighing its options for the digital bank after a would-be buyer was unable to raise enough capital to complete the deal.

The $9.9 billion-asset company said in a regulatory filing Wednesday that it could still end up selling BankMobile to Flagship Community Bank in Clearwater, Fla. Doing so would require Customers to spin off BankMobile to its own shareholders, then arrange a sale to Flagship in an all-stock transaction.

Customers has also received two all-cash proposals for BankMobile that could “be considered superior” to Flagship’s proposal, Chairman and CEO Jay Sidhu said in the filing. Those proposals would require mutual due diligence and the negotiation of a definitive agreement, he said.

For Flagship, a restructured deal could reduce the amount of capital it would need to raise by up to two-thirds, Frank Schiraldi, an analyst at Sandler O’Neill, wrote in a note to clients. Rather than raising $260 million as originally planned, Flagship may need to bring in only $85 million, or the amount required to remain well capitalized, he explained.

Flagship agreed in February to buy BankMobile for $175 million, or four times the digital bank’s 2016 revenue. That sale price also appeared to be a boost from initial estimates that placed BankMobile’s value at $100 million to $150 million.

Customers has said that the sale was spurred by the Durbin amendment’s cap on interchange fees. Sidhu said in a press release announcing the deal with Flagship that Customers would be unable to operate BankMobile profitably once the company's consolidated assets hit $10 billion.