Opus to Purchase Fullerton, Calif., Bank for $50 Million

Striking its second deal in three months, Opus Bank in Irvine, Calif., said late Monday that it is buying the $682 million-asset RMG Capital Corp. of Fullerton, Calif., for $50 million in cash.

RMG Capital is the parent company of the Fullerton Community Bank, an 84-year-old institution with eight branches in Southern California. In a statement, Opus Chairman, President and Chief Executive Officer Stephen H. Gordon said that the acquisition "is consistent with out long-term plan to build a relationship-based, super-regional bank with a community bank approach."

Gordon, a longtime California banker, took the helm at what was then Bay Cities National Bank last summer after he and a team of investor recapitalized the struggling bank with an investment of $460 million.

The bank was renamed Opus in September and since then Gordon has wasted little time deploying the capital. In March, Opus announced that it would acquire the $1.5 billion-asset Cascade Financial Inc. in Everett Wash., for roughly $22 million in cash. That sale is expected to close in end of this month. And just last week, Opus said that had signed lease agreements to open six new branches in Southern California by the end of this year and is in negotiations to open as many as 11 more throughout the state.

Opus said it would pay RMG shareholders $17.47 for each share they own, or 1.32 times RMG's tangible book value. The deal is expected to close in the fourth quarter

Opus currently $708 million of assets and just five branches, but if all the deals are completed as scheduled, it would have nearly $3 billion of assets and 42 branches in California and Washington by the end of this year.