For CFAB this 30-year anniversary is a pretty good milestone. Lea Klingert, president/chief executive officer, said that in all these years the bank had a steep learning curve. Lea informed that CFAB is famous with its cooperative loan, generating 50 to 60 new loans a year, with aggregate amounts averaging $4 million to $7 million, Klingert said. CFAB has some loans in the $1 million to $2 million range, but loans average about $80,000 to $100,000, she said. CFAB’s portfolio is about $25 million.
Most of the loans are for commercial fishing loans, generally of $80,000 to $100,000 for 12 years, and primarily for acquisition of a fishing permit, a boat or individual fishing quota shares. She also said that some of those loans are going to second or third generation Alaska members of the same families, and they include a lot of women who fish with a partner, a spouse, significant other or family member.
CFAB spreads word of its available services through participation in events ranging from the Alaska Young Fishermen’s Summit in Anchorage, the annual ComFish event in Kodiak and Pacific Marine Expo in Seattle to the Global Food Alaska Conference and Tradeshow in Soldotna, which is held every two years.
CFAB is different form other lending institutions in terms of its interdependence with members/borrowers, whose transactions with CFAB benefit themselves and other Alaska small-business owners. The state provided CFAB’s initial capital through the purchase of $32 million of preferred stock in 1980. That stock was later repurchased by CFAB through payments made to the state from 1991 through 1998, so today CFAB is owned entirely by its members/borrowers.
