Suffolk Bancorp's 4Q profits plummet 62%

Suffolk Bancorp, the troubled parent of the Suffolk County National Bank, said Tuesday its profits fell by 62.3 percent in the final three months of last year, and for all of last year it lost $76,000.

Another Long Island-based banking company, Flushing Financial Corp., reported slightly lower profits for the year and final quarter.

Suffolk, a Riverhead-based bank holding company, said its net earnings for the fourth quarter were $1,156,000, or 12 cents a share, compared with $3,069,000, or 32 cents a share, a year earlier.

Suffolk recently avoided having its stock delisted after it filed some financial reports late, and it faces at least three shareholder suits alleging it misled investors about its health.

For the year, the bank's loss compared to a profit of $6.3 million in 2010. The per-share loss of one cent in 2011 compared with a profit of 65 cents a share in 2010.

Suffolk was profitable in three of last year's four quarters. But those earnings failed to offset a loss of $7,574,000 for the first quarter.

The bank's recently appointed president and chief executive, Howard C. Bluver, said in a statement, "The bank was profitable in the fourth quarter, notwithstanding significant costs incurred to complete financial restatements," and he added that the bank exceeds regulatory capitalization requirements.

Suffolk blamed the fourth-quarter profit decline on lower net interest income -- the difference between the interest a bank earns on assets like loans and investments and what it pays out to depositors. It also cited increased costs for accounting, consulting and other items to file overdue financial reports; and declines in deposit service charges because of lower balances.

Shares of Suffolk, which released its results after the close of trading, were at $12.16 in after-hours trading Tuesday, unchanged from their closing price.

Flushing said its profit last year fell by 9 percent, to $35.3 million, or $1.15 a share, down 13 cents a share, because the year-earlier results included a one-time tax benefit.

Flushing, based in Lake Success and owner of the Flushing Savings Bank, said earnings per share for the final quarter were 27 cents a share -- slightly below analysts estimates and down a cent from the same quarter a year earlier. Earnings totaled $8.2 million, down 4.4 percent from a year earlier.

Flushing has 17 branches, most of them in Brooklyn and Queens, one in Manhattan and two in Nassau County. Its stock rose a penny in after-hours trading to $13.11.

This story has been corrected to reflect that Suffolk Bancorp had three profitable quarters in 2011.