Valley National Bancorp is doubling its market share in demographically attractive Bergen County and enhancing its presence in Hudson County by acquiring Oritani Financial.
The companies have entered into a merger agreement in which the common shareholders of Oritani will receive 1.60 shares of Valley common stock for each Oritani share they own. The transaction is valued at an estimated $740 million, based on Valley’s closing stock price on June 25, 2019.
Valley, and its wholly-owned subsidiary, Valley National Bank, has approximately $32.5 billion in assets, $25.4 billion in loans, $24.9 billion in deposits and more than 200 branches in New Jersey, New York, Florida and Alabama.
Oritani, and its wholly-owned subsidiary, Oritani Bank has approximately $4.1 billion in assets, $3.5 billion in loans, $2.9 billion in deposits, and maintains a branch network of 26 offices.
“Oritani’s conservative credit culture, combined with their customer focus should mesh seamlessly with that of Valley and our vision forward,” said Ira Robbins, Valley’s president & CEO. _x000D_
The combined company at close is expected to have approximately $38 billion in assets, $30 billion in loans, $29 billion in deposits, and 245 branches across New Jersey, New York, Florida, and Alabama.
In conjunction with the closing of this transaction, Valley is planning on restructuring approximately $635 million of higher cost FHLB borrowings. Valley anticipates the result of the merger, combined with debt restructuring will be immediately neutral to slightly accretive to earnings per share and tangible book value while increasing Tier 1 Common Equity by over 50 basis points.
J.P. Morgan Securities acted as financial advisor to Valley to provide a fairness opinion to Valley National Bancorp’s Board of Directors. The law firm of Day Pitney LLP acted as counsel to Valley. Oritani was advised by the investment banking firm of Keefe, Bruyette & Woods, a Stifel Company, and the law firm of Luse Gorman.
