Wilshire Bancorp To Buy Saehan Bancorp

(RTTNews) - Wilshire Bancorp, Inc. (WIBC), the parent company of Wilshire State Bank, said Monday that it has agreed to buy Saehan Bancorp (SAEB), the parent company of Saehan Bank, at the price of $0.42 per share which is valued at about $105.5 million, based on Wilshire's most recent closing price.

The combined company will have about $3.5 billion in assets with 35 branches.

The agreement was unanimously approved by the Board of Directors of each company. In addition, shareholders of Saehan Bancorp owning or controlling about 51% in the aggregate of the current outstanding shares of Saehan Bancorp have entered into voting and support agreements requiring them, subject to the terms and conditions thereof, to vote in favor of the merger. A two-thirds vote of the outstanding shares of Saehan common stock is necessary for shareholder approval of the merger.

Excluding transaction costs, the merger is expected to be immediately accretive to Wilshire Bancorp's earnings per share in the first year, with double digit accretion in subsequent years, and an internal rate of return in excess of 20%. Anticipated gross synergies are expected to be approximately $12.3 million, with 75% being realized in 2014 and 100% being realized thereafter.

The deal is expected to be completed by the end of this year.