Carver in New York finally exiting Tarp

Carver Bancorp in New York is poised to exit the Troubled Asset Relief Program after more than a decade.

The $569 million-asset company disclosed in a regulatory filing Thursday that it has agreed to buy 2.3 million shares of common stock from the Treasury Department for $2.5 million, or $1.08 a share. Carver will pay for the shares using a grant from Morgan Stanley.

The transaction should be completed around Aug. 6.

During the last financial crisis, Carver sold preferred stock to the Treasury. In October 2011, Carver issued common stock to the agency in exchange for the preferred shares. All accrued and unpaid dividend were paid to the Treasury at that time.

The Treasury valued the Carver common stock at $19 million in its July 2020 report to Congress.

The buyout comes a month after a grassroots effort led to a temporary surge in the stock prices of Black-run banks like Carver. The company’s shares, which got as high at $12.50 a share on June 8, closed at $5.70 on Thursday.

Carver also disclosed in mid-July that Morgan Stanley has relinquished its ownership of about 181,000 shares of common stock and roughly 13,500 shares of preferred stock at no cost to the company.