Customers Bancorp, through its wholly owned subsidiary Customers Bank, provides
financial products and services to small and middle market businesses, not-for-profits,
and consumers through its branches and offices in Southeastern Pennsylvania
(Bucks, Berks, Chester, Delaware and Philadelphia Counties), Rye Brook, Melville
and New York, New York (Westchester, Suffolk and New York Counties), Hamilton,
New Jersey (Mercer County), Providence, Rhode Island (Providence County), Portsmouth,
New Hampshire (Rockingham County) and Boston, Massachusetts (Suffolk County).
Customers Bank also provides liquidity to the mortgage market nationwide through
the operation of its loans to mortgage banking companies.
ustomers' strategic plan is to become a leading regional bank holding company
through organic growth and value-added acquisitions. Customers differentiates
itself from its competitors through its focus on exceptional customer service
supported by state of the art technology. The primary customers of Customers
Bank are privately held businesses, business customers, not-for-profit organizations,
and consumers. Customers Bank also focuses on certain low-cost specialty lending
areas such as multi-family/commercial real estate lending and lending to mortgage
banking businesses. The Bank’s lending activities are funded in part by
deposits from its branch model, which seeks higher deposit levels per branch
than a typical bank, combined with lower branch operating expenses, without
sacrificing exceptional customer service. Customers also creates franchise value
through its disciplined approach to acquisitions, both in terms of identifying
targets and structuring transactions. Enterprise risk management is an important
part of the strategies Customers employs.
Customers also launched BankMobile as a key strategic initiative in January
2015, recognizing the product delivery flexibility demanded by the millennial
generation and the low cost of the smart phone delivery channel. BankMobile
refers to Customers' efforts to build a full service bank that is accessible
to our customers anywhere and anytime through the customer's smartphone or other
web-enabled device. BankMobile provides a nationwide deposit-aggregation platform.
BankMobile focuses on the aggregation of low-cost deposits and currently offers
no fee banking, lines of credits to qualified customers, no overdraft fees,
higher than average interest rate on savings, and access to 55,000 (and if the
customer makes a monthly direct deposit over 400,000) ATMs across the U.S. Customers
believes that by consolidating BankMobile with the Disbursements business to
be obtained from Higher One, Inc., with approximately 2.0 million student deposit
customers, targeted for second quarter 2016, Customers will be uniquely positioned
to become the graduating students "bank for life" and service each
graduate's financial needs throughout their life. Successful execution of the
BankMobile strategy, including its consolidation with Higher One's Disbursements
business, will greatly accelerate BankMobile's ability to achieve profitability.
BankMobile's revenues are largely derived from interchange charges paid by the
product selling vendor and user based fees for specific activities (such as
lost card replacement) and net interest income on assets funded by the aggregated
deposits.
The management team of Customers consists of experienced banking executives
led by its Chairman and Chief Executive Officer, Jay Sidhu, who joined Customers
in June 2009. Mr. Sidhu brings over 40 years of banking experience, including
20 years as the Chief Executive Officer and Chairman of Sovereign Bancorp. In
addition to Mr. Sidhu, a number of the members of the current management team
have experience working together at Sovereign with Mr. Sidhu. Many other team
members who have joined Customers management team have significant experience
helping build and lead other banking organizations. Combined, the Customers
management team has significant experience in building a banking organization,
completing and integrating mergers and acquisitions, and developing valuable
community and business relationships in its core markets.
Customers offers a broad range of traditional loan and deposit banking products
and financial services, and more recently non-traditional products and services
through the successful Phase 1 launch of BankMobile in January 2015, to its
commercial and consumer customers. Customers offers an array of lending products
to cater to its customers’ needs, including small business loans, mortgage
warehouse loans, multi-family and commercial real estate loans, equipment loans,
residential mortgage loans and other consumer loans. Customers also offers traditional
deposit products, including commercial and consumer checking accounts, non-interest-bearing
demand accounts, money market deposit accounts, savings accounts and time deposit
accounts and cash management services. Prior to January 2015, deposit products
were available to customers only through branches of Customers Bank. With the
successful launch of BankMobile, Customers is able to provide fee free banking
to millennials, middle class American families and underserved consumers throughout
the United States.
The Bank’s commercial lending is divided into four distinct groups: Business
Banking, Small and Middle Market Business Banking, Multi-family and Commercial
Real Estate Lending, and Mortgage Banking Lending. This grouping is designed
to allow for greater resource deployment, higher standards of risk management,
strong asset quality, lower interest rate risk and higher productivity levels.
The Bank provides home equity and residential mortgage loans to customers.
Underwriting standards for home equity lending are conservative and lending
is offered to solidify customer relationships and grow relationship revenues
in the long term. This lending is important in the Bank’s efforts to grow
total relationship revenues for its consumer households. These areas also support
the Bank's commitment to lower and moderate income families in its market area.
The Bank plans to expand its product offerings in real estate secured consumer
lending.
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