Austin American-Statesman from Austin, Texas • 81

SECTION INSIDE Stock listings: F5-7 Thursday, July 4, 1991 Austin American-Statesman 15 NCNB's PAC spending soars Study shows big bank contributions way up during last 3 election cycles Sen. Phil Gramm, R-Texas, led all senators with $95,425 In big bank PAC contributions for the 1990 election cycle, a study shows. reached for comment Wednesday. Another committee member, Sen. Terry Sanford, led with $13,000 in NCNB PAC funds during the period.

Sen. Lloyd Bent-sen, D-Texas, got $5,750 from NCNB PACs. "Perhaps the most instructive example of political power co-evolving with government-assisted growth is NCNB said the SFP report. "With a firm push By Earl Golz American-Statesman Staff Campaign contributions by NCNB Corp. jumped from 18th to 4th place among political action committees of big bank holding companies between the 1988 and 1990 election cycles, according to a study of commercial bank PACs released Wednesday.

"Political spending by big banks with the most to gain from an industry bailout and financial deregulation soared over the past three federal election cycles, growing 15 times faster than federal PAC i i IS ii 1 from Uncle Sam, the North Carolina-based company has become the seventh largest banking company in the nation." Noting NCNB's rapid growth of 324 percent in PAC contributions from $130,531 in the 1986 election cycle to $553,207 for the 1990 cycle, the report noted that since NCNB's acquisition of First Re-publicBank in Texas in 1988, the regional bank "has become the most ambitious and creative feeder at the federal banking trough." "The 13 franchises and $3.6 billion in retail deposits it gobbled up See NCNB't, F4 photo by Tom Lankes Bid Bank seeking By Earl Golz American-Statesman The Federal Tuesday to Savings Association, Bank of America, country, needed Reserve Bank Savings, which been under spending overall," said spokesmen for the Southern Finance Project, a North Carolina-based research center. U.S. Sen. Phil Gramm, R-Texas, led all senators with $95,425 in big bank PAC contributions for the 1990 election cycle, the SFP said. Gramm, a member of the Senate Banking Committee who received $10,000 in NCNB PAC funds between 1987 and 1990, could not be KVUE SMI WR V' in for Southwest Savings of America acquisition tSJSSSi' Today's digest Loan arrangement Six Flags Corp.

has worked out a new loan arrangement with its major lender, diminishing the prospect of bankruptcy. The amusement park owner and operator in April said it would have to make changes to its $328 million, high-yield 16 percent bank debt to avoid default. Six Flags' chief lender, Security Pacific National Bank, agreed to give the company 18 months to raise more capital. In return, Six Flags would pay $1 million in additional fees, take a higher interest rate and an accelerated amortization schedule. Nine other members of Six Flags' banking group, who will meet July 15, must also approve the plan.

Six Flags owns AstroWorld in Houston and theme parks in several other cities. The company operates Six Flags Over Texas in Arlington and a park in Atlanta but doesn't have an ownership stake in them. Braniff CEO Braniff International Airlines before getting any planes off the ground, had changed chief executives. Gregory Dix, who ran charter flight operations for Princess Casinos on Monday replaced Sidney Srulevitch as chief executive officer of the new carrier. Srulevitch left the company Friday after a disagreement with Braniff owners Jeffrey Chodorow and Arthur Cohen.

Braniff began service Monday between Long Island and two Florida cities. On Tuesday, it began flying between Dallas-Fort Worth and Newark and Los Angeles. Scaling back General Dynamics, the largest office renter in Tarrant County, will vacate about 300,000 square feet of space by the end of 1992, a move that could depress Fort Worth commercial real estate values. "It could take five years to absorb the space GD is moving out of now," said David Cason, leasing director for one of the buildings the defense contractor uses for offices. Due to cutbacks in government defense spending, General Dynamics has been scaling back operations.

El Paso Electric Oregon officials reconsidered whether to go through with an agreement to buy more El Paso Electric junk bonds after the company was indicted in an insurance investments case. But Bill Unverzagt, Oregon's fixed-income investment officer, said this week he still supports investing state employee pension money in the bonds. He said the final decision is in the hands of state lawyers and likely will be made within a month. Oregon officials bought $50 million of bonds from El Paso Electric a year ago. They already had agreed to buy another $50 million last month when El Paso Electric and its former executives were indicted.

TV Staff nn viii I It KVUE 24 expanding its newsroom iate serving Austin and Central Texas. The project, which is costing $839,455 according to city building permits, is expected to be completed by December. KVUE is a member of the Gannett Broadcasting Group. O'Neal Construction recently broke ground on a addition to the offices of KVUE 24 at 3201 Steck Ave. The addition will house the news, sports and weather operations of the television station, which is the ABC-TV affil New Gold's Gym is cleared out Equipment producer removes machines in disagreement over payment Staff Reserve Bank in San Francisco confirmed that Bank of America has filed an application acquire Dallas-based Southwest Federal one of Texas' largest the second largest bank in the regulatory clearance from the Federal to be able to bid on Southwest Federal has nine branches in Austin and has conservatorship of the Resolution Trust Corp.

for more than a year. The federal thrift-liquidating agency hopes to sell the savings association by Sept. 30 or sooner. Competing with Bank of America, among other bidders, is Coastal Banc Savings Association of Houston, industry sources said. Coastal Banc was formed in a merger of five thrifts as a government-assistance transaction under the so-called Southwest Plan in 1988.

With assets of $873 million, Coastal has 11 branch locations outside of Houston, generally in cities along the Gulf Coast. San Francisco-based Bank of America has been seeking an acquisition vehicle for a major presence in Texas while there are still major assets available, experts say. The holding company had been investigating the possibility of acquiring First City, Texas, but problems, including the assumption of liability of First City's bad loans, stalled the process. Acquiring Southwest Federal Savings would put Bank of America in a position to rival the largest bank in the state, NCNB Texas. Southwest is the second largest Texas the RTC is trying sell.

Only Sunbelt Savings, with $8.4 billion in assets, is larger. The RTC lists Southwest, which has 67 branches, with assets of $4.9 billion and deposits of $3.3 billion. Bank of America, with $96.2 billion in assets, is second only to Citibank of New York, which had $157.8 billion at the end of 1990. The California retail bank has made extensive acquisitions of thrifts in Arizona and New Mexico recently to expand into those states. In Texas, the bank holding company acquired Village Green National Bank, a relatively small institution with $27 million in deposits.

The Houston bank was regarded as a toehold for building a network while the banking industry is recovering from more than 400 bank failures in the state during the latter 1980s. fYou open the door and you've got an empty place and you don't know what happened. 3 Terry Oliver, manager tect his interests, adding that Gold's was three weeks behind in its payments to him. "Under our agreement, they did not pay for the equipment or stick to their contract," Bruner said. Bruner said he decided on Monday that he should get his equipment back.

He said he had friends remove the equipment that night, using the key given to him by Gold's officials. Bruner said a note was left to explain why the equipment was removed. "I didn't take anything that wasn't mine," he maintained. But no matter who is in the right, the situation has been unsettling to those involved with the gym. "It was pretty shocking," said Terry Oliver, manager of the Oltorf facility.

"You open the door and you've got an See Equipment, F3 By R. Michelle Breyer American-Statesman Staff When employees and members of Gold's Gym of Austin arrived at the 01-torf Street facility Tuesday morning, they found the exercise equipment had been removed from the building. Tim Bruner, who Gold's was paying to build equipment for the chain's new second location, repossessed his equipment Monday night, and the situation has turned into a bitter contract dispute. Rusty Roberts, vice president of Gold's Gym of Austin, said Wednesday his company has paid almost all of the $27,000 owed Bruner and had a dispute over the balance owed. "The way it was set up, (Bruner) was given draws as he was producing equipment," Roberts said.

"He quit producing equipment and we quit giving him draws. He came in overnight and took everything, including things that were owned and paid for. He took all but what he couldn't get out the door." Gold's of Austin President David Carlson said his company has retained an attorney and plans to discuss the contract dispute with Bruner. Bruner said he was only trying to pro Weaker recovery seen in drop in home sales NCNB sells 14 Texas properties to developer Tho market day Dow industrials 2,934.70 Down 38.02 3,200 3,100 3,000 2,900 2.800 2,700 ThFMTWThFMTW NYSE 204.47 down 2.0S Up: 454 Down: 1,109 Unchanged: 484 Volume: 139.37 million 50 0 373.33 down 4.14 Dollar exchange Dollar In foreign currency Wed. Tue.

Britain Germany Japan Mexico .6224 .6245 1.8295 1.8350 139.41 138.97 3,020 3,020 Gold New York Comex $370.20 $2.30 Rep. Nat Bank $369.55 $1.95 Oil Light sweet crude $20.67 per barrel, down $0.15 (August delivery) Natural gas Price per 1,000 cubic feet $1,191, up 2.0 cents (August delivery) New home sales Seasonally adjusted annual rate, thousands of units 580 Jinn bbi mmu A JFMAM 1990 1991 May '90 Apr. '91 May '91 490 I474 Source: Commerce Department 1.0 percent, and April sales actually fell 0.2 percent rather than climbing 1.2 percent. Still, analysts maintained their belief the housing recession bottomed in January, when new home sales plummeted 10.8 percent to a 414,000 rate, the lowest since the See Weaker, F4 540 0 on the 14 properties. The leases average 10 years with options to renew.

NCNB Texas declined to identify the locations of the Texas properties, but two of the major acquisitions by SCI in Fort Worth include an 18-story structure in the heart of downtown and a branch building of 12 stories on the west side of the city, sources said. All of the office buildings previously had been owned by First RepublicBank of Dallas before NCNB's 1988 acquisition of the Texas bank holding company. The sale of the Texas property will enable NCNB to convert non-earning assets into loans for its Texas customers, said Timothy Hartman, NCNB Texas chairman. "Our philosophy is that the best use of our assets is to deploy them as loans," Hartman said. "That is more profitable to the bank and more beneficial to our Texas customers and the Texas economy.

We're bankers and banking is what we do best." By John McClain Associated Press WASHINGTON New home sales sank 3.3 percent in May, the second straight monthly decline, according to a government report Wednesday that showed the recovery from the housing recession much weaker than first thought. "We're seeing continued signs of a slow recovery," said economist Kermit Baker of Cahners Economics, a Newton, forecasting service. "We're going to see a few bumps along the way." David Seiders, an economist with the National Association of Home Builders in Washington, also viewed the report "as part of the process of a gradual up trend" that will include "some ups and downs." Thomas Holloway, an economist with the Mortgage Bankers Association in Washington, noted that the housing sector typically leads the overall economy out of recession. By Earl Golz American-Statesman Staff A subsidiary of an Italian construction company partly owned by Fiat Motor Co. has purchased seven office buildings and seven motor bank locations of NCNB Texas, the bank announced Wednesday.

The purchase for an undisclosed price was made by SCI Real Estate Development Ltd. of New York, a subsidiary of SCI, one of Italy's major construction and real estate organizations. Founded in 1944, SCI is partly owned by the founding family as well as by subsidiaries of Fiat and Pirelli. SCI has just completed construction of a large industrial building for Texas Instruments in central Italy. As part of the sales contract for structures in Dallas, Houston and Fort Worth, the bank will lease back essentially all of the space it now occupies, which is about half, "But (for housing growth) to be sustained, the economy needs to show some signs of life, which it didn't do in the winter and early spring," he said.

"Now it's starting to do so, and housing will show some pretty significant improvement." Most analysts discounted the possibility of a "double dip" recession in which the housing industry sinks back into a hole after a period of recovery. The Departments of Commerce and Housing and Urban Development said sales of single-family homes totaled a seasonally adjusted annual rate of 474,000 units, down from 490,000 a month earlier. The departments said their earlier estimates for February, March and April were not as strong as they first reported. Sales in February rose 17.9 percent rather than the 18.1 percent reported earlier. March sales advanced just 0.6 percent rather than.