It appears Seaway Bank survives again....

Subject to regulatory approval the remains of Seaway Bank will go from the ownership of State Bank of Texas to Self-Help Federal Credit Union. The North Carolina based financial institution already has a presence in the Chicago market where it took over the assets of Second Federal Savings.

In any case the well known Seaway Bank name survives once again. Steve Daniels who wrote a number of stories on Seaway Bank had this to write today:

The owners of the Texas bank that acquired Seaway from the Federal Deposit Insurance Corp. in late January now are selling Seaway's branches and deposits to a North Carolina-based credit union.

Greensboro, N.C.-based Self-Help Federal Credit Union, which specializes in lending to low-income and minority customers and already owns a Chicago lender focused on Hispanics, will take over Seaway's franchise beginning in May.

Dallas-based State Bank of Texas will continue to hold and manage Seaway's existing loans and will operate the foreign-exchange concessions at O'Hare and Midway airports.

With the deal, Self-Help, a nearly $2 billion-asset credit union with branches in California and Florida in addition to Chicago, could become an important provider of financing in South Side neighborhoods afflicted by joblessness, violence and population decline.

Self-Help also is clearly a better fit with the mission of what had been Chicago's largest black-owned bank for decades—provide credit in communities other banks avoid. State Bank of Texas is expert mainly in lending to hotel operators, often Indian-Americans as also is the family that owns the Texas bank. "It plays to everybody's strengths," said Sushil Patel, president of State Bank of Texas. "The result is a win for the community, Self-Help, the (National Credit Union Association) and State Bank of Texas."

Martin Eakes, who founded Self-Help more than three decades ago and remains its CEO, said he was intent on expanding into Chicago's South Side even before Seaway's failure. Once news of Seaway's demise hit, he reached out immediately to the Patel family, which owns State Bank of Texas.

The deal with State Bank of Texas is strikingly similar to the agreement that brought Self-Help to Chicago in 2013. Then, Rosemont-based Wintrust Financial, which had acquired the deposits of Chicago-based thrift Second Federal Savings after it failed, turned around a month or so later and agreed to sell the deposits to Self-Help.

Something tells me that when Seaway's business finally settles down it'll be back in the hands of Black-ownership. Yes I know wishful thinking, but at least for it's many depositors ownership who didn't seem like a good fit for the many communities Seaway serves has decided to move on from this market. They have the loans that Seaway once had and the airport foreign currency exchanges they'll have as long as the city will allow it.

If you want to read other posts about Seaway click here.