California Republic Bank (CRB) reported prime auto loan originations of $520 million in the first half of 2014, up 116% from the $279 million the bank reported for the same period one year earlier. In a company release, the bank said the bank continues to build out new locations and increase its base of auto dealerships.
CRB’s total serviced loan portfolio increased 88% to $1.4 billion by June 30, 2014, compared with $770 million a year ago. For the six months ended June 30, the net annualized charge-off rate for its auto loan portfolio was 0.24%, compared with 0.35% for the same period a year ago.
The bank also completed a $225 million prime automobile loan securitization transaction in the second quarter of 2014. The latest deal is the bank’s fifth securitization, and the third that is public.
“We are proud of our record loan growth and the continued nationwide expansion that was achieved this quarter,” said John De Cero, president of CRB. “However, we are most encouraged that our credit attributes have remained strong as we deepened our existing, long-term relationships and carefully built new ones, with only 0.23% loan losses in our prime auto loan portfolio, and no loan losses in our commercial banking portfolio, since our inception.”
