After many years covering banking, it’s time for a change in my beat

This is my last couple weeks on the banking beat. I’m going to make official what I’ve been doing for a while, covering real estate for the South Florida Business Journal. Only this time, it’ll be my main focus and I’ll hand off banking and insurance to a talented reporter.

It was a tough decision for me. Everyone who works with me knows how passionate I am about banking. The dozens of South Florida banks are like my chicks. I’ve followed them starting in 2008 as the recession began, watching some grow, some fall on the dreaded FDIC Friday after 5 p.m. There’s nothing like sitting on “bank death watch” with my obit for the ailing institution all ready to rip.

There’s not nearly as much of that now. Only one Florida bank has failed in 2014. Action hasn’t been lacking, with M&A activity and investigations, plus some heartwarming stories of loan growth. 

As much as I enjoyed this beat, I realized that I can’t advance unless I let it go. If I want to elevate my career, I can’t be married to any beat. I have to embrace new challenges.

That’s where real estate comes in. It’s the headline beat at SFBJ. For the better part of a year it hasn’t been fully staffed. While I’ve filled in with regular real estate stories, I haven’t given it my full attention. That’s about to change.

I’m going to explore this new condo craze and what it means for the local population. I’ll study housing affordability, the rapidly changing neighborhoods and go behind the deals.

Oh, and don’t forget Foreclosure Roundup. I’m not letting that go.

I’m hoping this change will make things better for me all around. Covering all these beats has been way too much work and it’s bled into my evenings. It’s taken away from family. It’s limited the time I can spend working on my next novel, and promoting my recent work Mute.

There’s just one matter to settle before I move on from banking. I’m heading to Miami federal court to cover the SEC vs. Alan Levan.

How’s that for a final salvo?

Who would banker Alan Levan be in scifi/comics?

Alan Levan pulled off a galactic-sized deal today. The chairman and CEO of BankAtlantic Bancorp (BBX) agreed to sell the good assets of his bank to BB&T while leaving the more problematic assets and the corporate debt with the holding company. You can read the serious part of my story at the South Florida Business Journal. But, here I will ask the bigger question from the perspective of a novelist:

If Alan Levan was a scifi or comic book character, who would he be?

The deal came after many people were betting for shares of BBX to plummet. One stock analyst told me that he wouldn’t cover the company because he doubted it would survive. I got calls from stock traders who told me its shares were worthless.

And yet, it’s last laughs for Levan.

To accomplish all this, Levan raised capital from shareholders and his BFC Financial holding company at a time when few banks could do so. He endured a nasty class action securities fraud trial and got the judge to toss out the verdict against him. He had regulators all over the bank, including a “cease and desist” order, an SEC investigation and an overdraft fee investigation. And he swung a deal to sell the bank that avoided the immediate repayment of a ton of corporate debt. 

That’s sort of like dodging a speeding train, leaping over a pit of alligators and then climbing up a wet chain with fire at your heels. So is Levan the elusive Flash? 

Hmm, BankAtlantic is all about red outfits. But it’ hard to call banking flashy. 

It’s not fair to call Levan a runner. If anything, he doesn’t shy from confronting critics. He took on banking analyst Dick Bove and ABC News in court. He won a motion for sanctions against the class action securities attorneys that dragged him to trial – and then he appealed because he wanted MORE damages for the sanctions. He has waged public battles as a shareholder of restaurant chain Benihana and (briefly) Office Depot. 

And if you don’t pay your mortgage to the bank, well, just ask developer Dan Catalfumo what happens.

The bottom line: don’t mess with Alan Levan.

Maybe a more appropriate character for Levan would be Nightcrawler from X-Men. Not only can he teleport to escape danger, but he is an expert swordsman. If you can somehow catch Nightcrawler, he will make you pay.

Of course, Levan isn’t blue and nor does he have a tail. Moreover, Nightcrawler prefers to hide in the shadows and he rarely takes a leadership role with the X-Men. Levan is almost always the top guy at his companies and he certainly doesn’t hide.  

So who is a leader, evasive from danger and tough in a fight? Let’s travel to Star Wars and pick Han Solo.

Imperial Star Destroyer (federal regulators) on his tail? Light speed, Millennium Falcon! Leading the rescue of a princess (or his shareholders)? Blaster ready! Frozen in carbonite (wrong side of a jury verdict)? Friends and lawyers set him free. 

And remember that Han Solo was able to fend off Jabba the Hut, who wanted to collect on his debt. Levan has confronted issues with debt on soured real estate deals at Levitt & Sons and Core Communities but he exited those properties without the creditors coming after him.  

So there you have it: Alan Levan is the Han Solo of banking.

What does that make his son Jarett Levan, the president/CEO of the BankAtlantic subsidiary? I’m torn between the child prodigies of Children of Dune and Ender’s Game. Is running a bank at a young age more comparable to riding a giant sand worm or piloting a spaceship against an alien horde?