Fremont names executive team
Sub-prime mortgage casualty Fremont General Corp. is getting new management after all, seven weeks after a bank turnaround specialist withdrew his offer to invest $80 million and lead a new executive team at the Santa Monica company.
Fremont said Monday that its president and chief executive, Louis J. Rampino, and its executive vice president and chief operating officer, Wayne R. Bailey, had resigned. They are being replaced by former executives from Commercial Capital Bancorp, an Irvine company that specialized in loans on apartment buildings and small commercial real estate. Washington Mutual Inc. bought Commercial Capital last year for nearly $1 billion.
Commercial Capital co-founder Stephen H. Gordon was named Fremont’s chairman and CEO. Several of his former colleagues at Commercial also are joining Fremont: David S. DePillo as vice chairman and president, Richard A. Sanchez as executive vice president and chief administration officer, Thea Stuedli as executive vice president and chief financial officer, and Donald E. Royer as executive vice president and general counsel.
Federal regulators ordered Fremont in March to quit making loans that sub-prime borrowers couldn’t afford and to cease operating with management whose “policies and practices are detrimental.” The company laid off most of the 2,400 employees of its sub-prime mortgage operation and later sold its other main business, which made loans on commercial properties.
In May, Gerald J. Ford, a specialist in bank turnarounds, said he would invest in Fremont and bring in his own experts to lead it. He backed out of that deal in late September for reasons that have not been made clear.
In a statement, Gordon promised a turnaround of Fremont, but the stock market appeared unimpressed. Fremont shares fell 1 cent to $2.43. They have plunged 85% this year.
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