On Tuesday, Charlotte, N.C.-based Truist Financial Corporation disclosed it was exiting the near-prime auto loan business after reaching a deal to sell its $5.5 billion loan portfolio. \u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n
That business decision also reverberated in North Texas: The same day, Truist\u2019s auto loan subsidiary, Regional Acceptance Corporation, informed the Texas Workforce Commission it\u2019s closing its office in southeast Arlington and laying off 205 full-time employees.\u00a0<\/p>\n
\u201cAs part of Truist\u2019s previously announced agreement to sell substantially all assets of Regional Acceptance Corporation (RAC), teammates at the RAC location at 1351 East Bardin Road in Arlington, Texas, are affected,\u201d Brian Davis, a Truist representative, wrote in an email to The Dallas Morning News. \u201cWe\u2019re committed to supporting them through this transition including consideration for other roles at Truist, severance benefits, and job search assistance.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n
RAC, a company that\u2019s based in Greenville, N.C., and has a presence around the country, including a business center in Plano, will end its operations at the Arlington site when the loan deal is finalized, according to the company\u2019s WARN letter. It was unclear how many RAC employees around the country received layoff notices.\u00a0<\/p>\n
The Arlington employees, who are not unionized, are expected to begin losing their jobs in late November, and all employees are expected to be out by the end of February. \u00a0<\/p>\n
Truist\u2019s business pivot was in part the work of its new CEO, Michael Lyons, who took over the reins of the bank Sept. 1 after most recently leading the global fintech company Fiserv.<\/p>\n
\u201cMike will move\u00a0Truist forward with purpose and care, and a sense of urgency to realize our potential,\u201d Bill Rogers, Truist\u2019s outgoing CEO and new executive chair, said of Lyons in June<\/a>.\u00a0<\/p>\n That urgency included dropping a sector of the bank\u2019s business that had lately been breaking even in order to tighten the company\u2019s focus and improve its credit risk profile. \u201cI think in the \u2026 \u00a0simplest form, it\u2019s going to be focusing on fewer things that frankly leverage our strengths,\u201d Michael Maguire, Truist\u2019s chief financial officer, said in a conversation Tuesday at the Barclays Global Financial Services Conference.\u00a0<\/p>\n The buyer of Truist\u2019s $5.5 billion near-prime loan portfolio, which applied to borrowers with midtier credit profiles, is Apollo Global Management,\u00a0Bloomberg reported<\/a>. \u00a0 \u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n