BANKING : Marine National Bulks Up in Assets, Professional Clients

Marine National Bank, long a quiet, slow-growing, profitable bank, is serving notice that it wants to be a bigger player in the professional banking markets served by community banks.

The Irvine bank picked up two branches and half the assets of the failed American Interstate Bank on Friday, and it’s looking for more, said Mark E. Simmons, Marine National’s president.

After American Interstate’s higher-cost deposits are pulled from the bank within two weeks, Marine National expects to have $110 million to $120 million in assets, ranking it as a mid-size bank among Orange County’s remaining 30 independent banks.

Simmons said his bank will keep 17 of American Interstate’s 24 employees. The top managers at American Interstate were relatively new and not responsible for its problems, but they were let go.

“There were some good people. Unfortunately, we just don’t need them,” Simmons said.

Customers, including original investors, appear to be staying with Marine National, he said. Most of the depositors simply wanted to know if they will still be able to have no-fee checking accounts. Simmons said he assured them that nothing will change--except the interest rates on high-cost deposits.

Marine National will pay about $100,000 for the right to receive about $38.7 million in American Interstate deposits and will buy about $12.3 million of the bank’s loans. The Federal Deposit Insurance Corp., which protects depositors, will advance about $27.7 million and keep $31.4 million in assets.

American Interstate fits in with Marine National’s needs, the banker said. With offices in Irvine and Santa Ana, Marine National had wanted to pick up an office in central or north Orange County, and American Interstate has a branch in Orange.

The failed bank has its main office in the Fashion Island-Newport Center area of Newport Beach, a vastly different setting, Simmons said, than the nearby John Wayne Airport area where Marine National is based.

In addition, American Interstate targeted professionals, such as doctors and lawyers. Marine National serves the same type of customers.

“We’d like to look at other opportunities,” Simmons said. “We’re not exactly sitting in the weeds, but we’re looking for the right thing.”

American Interstate, he said, “is our kind of business. These guys do what we do, though not much of it in the last few years.”