I am thinking of doing my workshop on EWBC.  This is a regional bank, primarily in southern California, with some branches in China, with about a $1B market cap.  It's 5-year revenue and EPS growth have been impressive at 24.8 and 20.7, respectively.

Lately the stock has been pounded such that its trailing PE is only 6.8.  This is primarily on account of the expectation that loan losses will increase due to the real estate market.  The bank has stayed away from sub-prime housing loans, but has made construction loans which have taken on some additional risk lately.  Based on my preliminary analysis, however, I think the market has driven the stock down below its value, even after accounting for a larger loan loss in the coming year. 

I bought some shares and am thinking of buying more. 

Is anyone else in the StockCentral community following this stock, or interested in a workshop on it?

I was also thinking we might send an email to all StockCentral members in the southern California area, to see if anyone is a customer of this bank.  This might give the workshop some additional insights on the company.

I'm attaching a preliminary stock study.

Robert,

> I bought some shares and am thinking of buying more.

Me too!  I've included EWBC in one of my experimental portfolios.

> I was also thinking we might send an email to all StockCentral members in the southern California area, to see if anyone is a customer of this bank. 

I live in the So. Cal area but I am not a customer of the bank.  The bank has a strong hold on asian customers.  Talking to some of my asian friends, they are saying that a large part of growth for this bank is going to come from China.

Bakul

I also own some EWBC and have been following the company.

The poor last qtr.,  lower analyst projections for the coming year, and the existing credit market problems are all contributing

to the negative market performance. A workshop on the bank would be interesting.

Incidently I cannot read a .itk file as I am a SA user.

Steve Gideon

Hi Steve, Here's my EWBC stock analysis in SDF format . . . does this work for you?  Let's move this discussion to the EWBC board.  Steve, Bakul, hopefully you'll join me?

I felt that EWBC had value even prior to being "pounded down" and would be most interested in your analysis.

My club owns EWBC.  Would love to see discussion on it.

Steve, et. al.,

I've attached my SSG with my judgments.  It's a pdf file so that everyone should be able to view it.  Here's what I am thinking about this company: as long as the company can maintain ROE above 12% during the real estate doldrums, I'd be OK with it.

Bakul