Atlanta Business Chronicle: Interest rate and mortgage pricing pressures drove NetBank Inc. deeper into the red in the first quarter. (NetBank Payment Systems, a wholly owned subsidiary of NetBank Inc., did not report a loss.) The company posted a net loss of $11 million and a loss per share of 24 cents, compared with a net loss of $2 million and a loss per share of 4 cents in the first quarter of 2005.
"We are very disappointed with first-quarter results but believe they have to be considered in context with prevailing market conditions and the progress we have made over the past few years against our long-term strategic objectives," said Douglas K. Freeman, the company's chairman and chief executive. "We have fundamentally improved the long-term earnings prospect of the company by building out the bank, our retail mortgage franchise and our ATM and payment processing businesses. But we are now facing a kind of perfect storm of market and economic conditions that has put pressure on our businesses across the board."
