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The Odd Couple at Main Street National Bank by Christopher Menkin
Thomas J. Depping Office at Sierra Cities The press release was received last Tuesday, on December 2, 2004: ” Main Street National Bank, Kingwood, Texas announced that Robert “Bob” Fisher has joined the Bank as Senior Vice President – Broker, Lessor and Program Development. “Fisher served as the 2002 President of the United Association of Equipment Leasing and has served as a UAEL board member for a number of years....” Since that date the public relation person who sent the press release has not returned telephone calls nor e-mails, Bob Fisher spoke briefly and said it would return the call, but has not, and while I did reach the much loved leasing leader, Chairman of the Bank Thomas J. Depping (the press release had his direct telephone number,) it was a very quick response. Surprising it was his direct number, and after I identified myself, requesting a time when it was convenient for a short interview to elaborate on the press release, he responded,“ You have a bone to pick with me and I am not going to talk to you.” I thought an e-mail with the agenda spelled out might bring a response. The following was sent to his e-mail address: “I would like to correct some of the minor information in the press release. As American Leasing, I have done business with Bob Fisher since 1987---maybe 1986. I would not have done business with him if I did not respect him. I have no bone to pick with him. If you think I have one with you, it may be only in hearing from your detractors, rather than directly from you. “I am interested in your "broker protection" policy, whether you will be doing business with only licensed brokers (such as in California,) whether you plan a direct sales staff in addition to attracting brokers, and will you be eventually changing the name of the "department" such as other have done at Netbank and Santa Barbara Savings and Loan, do you see the times as competitive as they were five to seven years ago? This should be viewed as an opportunity to plug what makes your operation different than your competitors. “Leasing News's mission is to continue to be independent, accurate, and fair to the best of our ability in reporting the news about the equipment leasing industry. “I have served on a regional bank board, the executive board, and have been in the leasing industry for 34 years now with seven leasing partnerships (mostly in Silicon Valley, where our recourse and non-recourse lines came from at one time local banks—they grew, too) I bring this experience in reporting to the equipment leasing industry.” December 8, it brought a telephone call from Mike Hoffman, who appears to be his executive assistant, or if this were “West Wing,” he might be more of a “front man.” He left a voice mail that he was having trouble with his telephone line, and he certainly was. We never connected.
Sierra Cities Thomas J. Depping Looking Out Upon Houston, Texas First, the “broker protection policy.” Every Sierra Cities “founder” who we spoke to who had sold their company ( merged with Sierra Cities ) became very unhappy about the broken promises. Several of the directors sued the company, and then the company who bought them, American Express, had to pursue or settle. To my knowledge, all prevailed in their cases with the proviso they could not divulge the “settlement.” (Among them, Fred Van Etten, Mark McQuitty, to name a few.) Among the complaints was calling on “their” broker customers, lessee's and vendors, as they had given their word to their brokers this would not happen. It was hard fact from everyone from Don Zaretsky to Mark McQuitty and Eric Barash and others. They not only had verbal promises, but written contracts. Perhaps Main Street National Bank is not offering “broker protection,” and if they are, do they mean it? What assurances will they give to young brokers. Manifest US Bancorp has it in writing, in public, an insurance policy. What will Tom Depping offer? He put the $21 million into this existing bank to go into the leasing business and obviously utilize the banking community for this “product.” He appears very serious. How serious? What kind of guarantee is Main Street National Bank going to make with those that discount or “sell” leases to them? Sierra Cities was not a federal regulated bank and did not have to follow the stringent rules, such as working only with “licensed brokers.” Will Main Street National Bank require people who they deal with to be licensed under the various states laws? Nothing wrong with this as Balboa, Marlin, US Bancorp, among others do. The main thrust was from direct and private label leasing programs, rather than direct broker business. Will this be the case again? Is there a plan to keep the name of the leasing “division,” the same as the bank, or a new name in the near future? Not a serious question, but one of curiosity, unless the overall plan is to spin off the leasing division in the distant future. What changes do you see today from seven years ago? At one time you were moving to become a “dot com” operation, actually changing the name to FirstSierra.com. Is the broker approach going to be the main thrust. What will make you different from the competition? Will you be “laying off” leasing portfolio's to other banks or institutions? Will you be offering leasing programs to smaller banks or other institutions? Let's move form this multi-millionaire (he invested $21 million in cash in the small bank formed by others in 1984,) promoter to the ex-Marine with war experience in Viet Nam, a marathon runner, physically fit, tough credit man, no nonsense, take no ground street fighter Robert J. Fisher, who at the UAEL conference was proud to show on the screen his family and he on many vacations together, who's company ran into the perfect storm.
Personally I started doing business with Bob Fisher non-recourse discounting as American Leasing when he was a credit manager at CIT back in the 1980's. As I remember, the operation moved, and the announcement of September 26,1990 had him as “National Credit Manager” for Datronic Rental Corporation, Schaumburg, Il. Later the company became New Era Funding, moving to Hoffman Estates, Illinois, perhaps in 1993. As I remember the story, the president or principal of Datronic Rental Corporation co-mingled funds with real estate transactions. He evidently was running the company as he wanted, considered it “his money,” and was shut down. It put several leasing companies out of business who were dealing with New Era, most notably the Perry Morris Company, run by brother and sister Jeff and Kris Morris (they are the ones who explained the situation at New Era to me, their viewpoint.) Bob Fisher started Fisher-Anderson, LC, moving to Des Moines, IA, where his brother-in-law lived, as I remember. He brought Sandy Thrasher as vice-president of Credit him. Scott Anderson knew very little about equipment leasing. He spent three full days at American Leasing, Santa Clara, California, all day, and dinner with staff at night, seeing the entire operation. American Leasing did business with Fisher-Anderson. The company grew, and according to a Marcap (their reported main line of credit) Press Release: “Fisher-Anderson is based in Des Moines, Iowa, is a small ticket leasing company with 40 employees. ( Marcap would not confirm by telephone the company had completed $350,000 in sales, as the Main Street National Press release stated, and perhaps this number is correct or the culmination of a specific time period.) A Capital Stream press release about Fisher-Anderson using their software the company had “...41 brokers, representing 25 and 30 small-to-$75,000) lease deals a day. In the five year history of the company, perhaps the number was an average of $50 million a year. During this time, many broker representatives left (or were let go, we had several representatives let go, one a lady, who eventually retired from the business) and as Leasing News reported about the troubles with a vehicle division leaving or the changes going on, and troubles reported by brokers, the cordial relationship built over the years seemed to erode, particularly during his tenure as the United Association of Equipment Leasing was going through quite a turmoil. We were popular when we promoted conferences, events, but bums when we reported anything else or asked question they evidently didn't think we should ask. The same year he was president of UAEL, Bob resigned from Fisher-Anderson. February 28, 2002, he announced Scott Anderson would be winding down the company, that they had sold 100% interest to Marcap in December, 2001. He would be starting FireRock Capital. The truth Marcap was getting out of certain aspects of the business. There is more to the story, but let's leave it at that. Marcap took over the operation and Scott eventually moved to FireRock Capital. April, 2003, Bob resigned as president of FireRock Capital to become sales manage for Douglas-Guardian, Houston, Texas (the company “... has been providing collateral control, inspection, and valuation services to secured lenders since 1932. http://www.douglasguardian.com/) Scott Anderson became president of the company (a call to a Jim Wright listed on a FireRock Capital website connects to Liberty Bank Leasing. Whether Firerock Capital is still in business is one of the items an interview would have brought up-to-date and also clarified any of the information in this report. Readers e-mail addresses from this company ceased earlier this year.) The original press release concluded: “Tom Depping, Chairman of National Bank stated: ‘Bob Fisher will not only bring in a great deal of experience and knowledge to the Bank but he will bring a commitment to serve the leasing industry.” Depping went on to say, ‘Bob is going to be a big part of making Main Street Bank a national presence in the equipment leasing industry and truly ‘America's Small Business Bank'.” If Leasing News receives a response from Mr. Depping or Mr. Fisher, ---- For new readers, you may be interested in the story about Sierra Cities/First Sierra and Thomas J. Depping: Sierra Cities/First Sierra is also part of the RW Professional story as when American Express bought the company they found several portfolio “problems,” among them RW Professional, who they sued for $20,000,000. The suit was put off pending the criminal case against RW Professional and its officers for fraud, among other items More Current stories can be found here: including: Bank of NY Buys Out of RW Professional Mess In all of the above stories, Leasing News has attempted numerous times for a statement, comment, or interview with Thomas J. Depping. We look forward to any comment or statement he may want to make for readers of Leasing News.
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