OAKLAND, Calif. – Self-Help FCU, a conglomeration of troubled community development credit unions created by North Carolina’s Center for Community Self-Help, plans its biggest merger yet, of troubled 1st Pacific CU, a one-time $235 million CDCU in Vallejo, Calif.
In just two years’ time, 2008 charter Self-Help FCU, the sister of much larger state charter Self-Help CU, has built up almost $200 million in assets by acquiring four troubled credit unions in the Bay Area and just north: People's Community CU in Oakland, Community Trust CU in Modesto, El Futuro CU in Porterville and Kern Central CU in Bakersfield.
Now the CDCU start-up has applied to state regulators to acquire ailing 1st Pacific, which has wracked up losses the past three years of $1.6 million in 2008, $3.4 million in 2009 and $2.3 million for the first six months of 2010, while its net worth has declined to 5.5%.
If approved, the merger would create a California CDCU with almost $400 million, separate from the $500 million state-chartered Self-Help CU, bringing almost $1 billion of credit union assets under the control of the Center for Community Self-Help.
The Center for Community Self-Help has grown into a CDCU conglomerate that operates both CDCUs, as well as the Self-Help Ventures Fund and the consumer lobby the Center for Responsible Lending.
