Shares of Security Bank Corp. plummeted 13.5% Friday, to $11.37 a share, a day after the Macon, Ga., reported another spike in nonperforming loans tied to residential construction.
The $2.7 billion-asset company said late Thursday that third-quarter nonperfoming assets increased 19% from the previous quarter, to $65 million, and that it expects to record as much as $20 million of loan-loss provisions for the rest of the year. In the second quarter, its nonperforming assets jumped 187% from a year earlier.
Lorraine Miller, Security Bank's senior vice president of investor relations, said that the problems with asset quality can be traced to deterioration in the Atlanta residential real estate market.
"It's not a new geographic segment that is coming under pressure. It's the same problem we've had," Ms. Miller said. "It's just the severity of the problem has gotten more troubling … over the last few months."
