Two struggling community banks — Waccamaw Bancshares Inc. in Whiteville, N.C., and First Mariner Bancorp in Baltimore — have received letters from the Nasdaq Stock Market warning that their stocks could be removed from the exchange for failing to meet basic listing requirements.
The $561 million-asset Waccamaw is in danger of having its stock delisted because it has yet to file its 2010 annual report and its quarterly report for the first quarter.
Waccamaw has until June 3 to submit a plan to regain compliance and said in a news release Monday that it intends to meet the deadline. Its shares fell sharply on news of the potential delisting, trading at 65 cents midday trading, down 18% from Friday's closing price.
The $1.3 billion-asset First Mariner, meanwhile, said Friday that it is in violation of listing requirements because it has failed to maintain a minimum stockholders' equity of $2.5 million. In the quarter that ended March 31, the company lost $7.3 million and said that total shareholders' equity had swung to negative $3.35 million from more than $3.7 million three months earlier.
First Mariner has until July 5 to submit a plan to regain compliance. The company is in the midst of trying to raise $160 million of capital and has commitment to receive a $36 million investment from a New York private-equity group.
