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Non-Tech : USAB - USABancShares.com -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: Triffin who wrote (61)	4/17/1999 8:00:00 PM
From: LTK007	Respond to of 2419

Jim here is an article that at least firmly establishes USAB is not 3 guys in a garage:) I found this rather interesting even though about 7+ months old 09/09/1998 KRTBN Knight-Ridder Tribune Business News: The Philadelphia Inquirer Copyright (C) 1998 KRTBN Knight Ridder Tribune Business News; Source: World Reporter (TM) Sep. 9--A Philadelphia bank that invested in one of its Center City rivals in the spring is now pressuring that bank's management to reform its operations and boost its sagging stock price. USA BancShares, owner of BankPhiladelphia , borrowed $900,000, and spent another $185,000 in corporate funds, to take a 1.8 percent stake in Republic First Bancorp, owner of First Republic Bank, according to documents filed with the Securities and Exchange Commission and made public yesterday. Since USA began investing in Republic on April 28, Republic's stock has fallen from $12.375 per share to a close of $9.75 yesterday. To boost the value of its investment, USA has begun "exploring all investment alternatives, including the making of strategic suggestions to Republic First about the course it should be taking as a company," USA chairman Kenneth Tepper said yesterday in a statement. While open struggles are unusual among investors in publicly traded companies, activists have provoked sharp fights at several local banks recently. After a series of dissident shareholders filed lawsuits and contested board elections, the management of Inter-Boro Federal Savings Bank of Cherry Hill agreed in April to sell the bank to the owners of Hudson Savings Bank. Last year, an outside investor ended his legal fight with the owners of Pennsylvania Savings Bank after the bank agreed to sell more stock. In serving notice on Republic, USA was joined by one of USA's directors, Zeev Shenkman, who owns 3.3 percent of Republic. A former chief financial officer of the Today's Man clothing stores and a former executive of women's footwear maker Ryka Inc., Shenkman is now head of investment, mergers and acquisitions for Internet Industries Inc. of Exton. Until earlier this year, Shenkman was a Republic director. He resigned, and joined USA BancShares board in April; he declined yesterday to say why he had switched. According to the SEC filing, his Republic investment was financed partly with money borrowed over the last two years from USA BancShares' BankPhiladelphia and its predecessor, Peoples Thrift Savings Bank. Shenkman said Republic First stock is "grossly undervalued," and that he and Tepper "intend to pursue whatever means are available to us to make sure the value is restored to that institution." Republic officials did not return calls seeking comment yesterday. Last month, chairman Jere A. Young said the bank was looking for a new chief executive officer, citing disappointing growth under founder Rolf A. Stensrud, whose term expires in December. According to the SEC documents, Shenkman has a $1 million line of credit with BankPhiladelphia , which has been used partly to finance his investment in Republic. He has bought and sold shares in Republic since joining the USA BancShares board, on which he serves as vice chairman, but his total holdings have changed little since last winter, according to the documents. Financed partly by BT Alex. Brown Inc., a Baltimore-based investment bank, and partly by an unnamed bank, USA began buying Republic stock for its own account in April, a month before Shenkman joined the board. The purchases continued through the summer, with the bank buying Republic shares as recently as Aug. 28, according to the SEC filing. Shenkman was "absolutely not" involved in USA's decision to invest, Tepper said yesterday. Tepper said USA had invested in other banks, and made money on all of them. He said his bank had held nearly 5 percent of Philadelphia's Regent Bank in the months leading up to its sale this summer to JeffBanks Inc., owner of Jefferson Bank. Tepper would not say when the Regent shares were sold or how much his bank had profited.

To: Triffin who wrote (61)	4/17/1999 8:10:00 PM
From: LTK007	Respond to of 2419

Here is another the established that USAB are a fiesty outfit--this is from a Gannet service article about small banks fighting back against mega banks and contained this bit about BankPhiladelphia(which is USAB owned) " Some of the ads have even stirred controversy. BankPhiladelphia 's ad featuring its president standing in front of a Confederate flag raised some eyebrows and prompted the Philadelphia Inquirer ultimately to stop running it. The ad was designed to highlight First Union's North Carolina roots and warned customers to ''Beware of strangers... especially when it comes to your money.'' ''Our highlighting a Confederate flag probably made a statement more definitive than most,'' said Kenneth A. Tepper, president and CEO of BankPhiladelphia , a unit of USABancshares. ''The ad campaign's focus was to let people in Philadelphia know that there's been a huge expanson by some of the major banks out of the South. They're taking local lending authority and local access to bankers and making it a relic of American banking.'' The ads also mark a new style for bank promotions. Gone are the stodgy old images focused solely on numbers, rates and products. Gone is the projection of banks as conservative and boring. The new ads are far more aggressive in directly targeting rivals and using humor to try to make their points and stand out."