Pacific Mercantile Bancorp, Costa Mesa, Calif., has announced that its wholly owned banking subsidiary, Pacific Mercantile Bank, will exit the wholesale mortgage banking business.The company said the decision was based on several factors, including the steady growth in its commercial banking business and the increasing cost of operations and variability of expected results in wholesale mortgage banking. "The wholesale mortgage division was good for us in the early years of the bank when there was a decline in the commercial interest rates and a slowing in the economy that led to declines in commercial loan demand," said Raymond E. Dellerba, president and chief executive officer of Pacific Mercantile. "Now, however, we are seeing a steady growth in our commercial loan business, and we wish to deploy our capital and other resources into our successful core business, commercial banking, and the continued growth of our commercial banking franchise." Pacific Mercantile Bank can be found online at http://www.pmbank.com.
