------------------------------------------------------------------------ Good Afternoon! Your news from CardLine for 2002-07-03 ... ------------------------------------------------------------------------ FDIC SELLS NEXTBANKâ??S CARD PORTFOLIO The Federal Deposit Insurance Corp. has sold NextBank N.A.â??s credit card portfolio to Merrick Bank, of South Jordan, UT, for $128 million, FDIC officials disclosed Tuesday. Merrick Bank is a subsidiary of CardWorks LP, of Plainview, NY. As part of the sale, the FDIC agreed to a short-term loss-sharing arrangement. The value of NextBankâ??s card loans had dropped to $1.45 billion from $1.74 billion in November, Standard & Poorâ??s says. The Office of the Comptroller of the Currency closed NextBank N.A., a subsidiary of NextCard Inc., Feb. 7 after determining that NextCard executives could not find a way to stem the losses caused by the poor quality of its cardholder base (CardLine, 2/8). The FDIC also estimates that the failure of Phoenix-based NextBank will cost the bank insurance fund between $300 million and $400 million. NextCard is based in San Francisco.
