6 Bank Stock Picks for Earnings Season From FBR

Signature Bank
Shares of Signature Bank (SBNY) of New York closed at $64.21 Friday, returning 7% year to date, following a remarkable 20% return during 2011.

The shares trade for 2.1 times tangible book value and for 15 times the consensus 2013 earnings estimate of $4.22 a share. The consensus 2012 EPS estimate is $3.67.

Signature Bank will report its first-quarter earnings on Tuesday before the market opens, with a consensus EPS estimate of 84 cents a share, compared to EPS of 85 cents in the fourth quarter and 82 cents a year earlier.

Ramsey rated Signature Bank outperform with a $75 price target, and in early April said that the bank's "new equipment/ transportation financing subsidiary [is] a big positive for the story, and a catalyst for shares to outperform," providing "another avenue for Signature to grow loans and utilize its low cost deposit funding."

Ramsey said that the 30-member equipment financing team that came "largely from All Points Capital (a subsidiary of Capital One (COF))," should "enable Signature to add $100 million of new loans a quarter once fully leveraged, which is significant given its loan growth of approximately $400 million per quarter in 2011."

The analyst called Signature Bank "the best growth story in banking, having grown loans and deposits 31% and 24%, respectively, over the last year."

Ramsey estimated that Signature Bank will post first-quarter EPS of 86 cents, with full-year EPS of $3.70 for 2012 and $4.45 for 2013.

Interested in more on Signature Bank? See TheStreet Ratings' report card for this stock.

>>To see these stocks in action, visit the 6 Bank Stock Picks for Earnings Season From FBR portfolio on Stockpickr.

-- Written by Philip van Doorn in Jupiter, Fla.

To contact the writer, click here: Philip van Doorn.

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Philip W. van Doorn is a member of TheStreet's banking and finance team, commenting on industry and regulatory trends. He previously served as the senior analyst for TheStreet.com Ratings, responsible for assigning financial strength ratings to banks and savings and loan institutions. Mr. van Doorn previously served as a loan operations officer at Riverside National Bank in Fort Pierce, Fla., and as a credit analyst at the Federal Home Loan Bank of New York, where he monitored banks in New York, New Jersey and Puerto Rico. Mr. van Doorn has additional experience in the mutual fund and computer software industries. He holds a bachelor of science in business administration from Long Island University.

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