Great American First Savings Bank

Gordon C. Luce, chairman and chief executive of Great American Bank, will retire this year once the embattled thrift finds a replacement. In making the announcement at Great American's annual shareholders meeting, Luce acknowledged reports circulating for weeks that he planned on leaving the San Diego-based firm this year. While the savings and loan has no mandatory retirement age, Luce will turn 65 in November. He has been Great American's chief executive since 1969 and chairman since 1979.

Thrift regulator James M. Cirona, offered the chief executive job at troubled Great American Bank last week, won't be taking the position. Cirona, president of the Federal Home Loan Bank of San Francisco, expressed strong interest in the Great American job, but he and the thrift's board could not agree on terms of an employment contract, sources close to the negotiations said Friday.

Great American Bank has offered its chief executive job to James M. Cirona, president of the Federal Home Loan Bank of San Francisco since 1983, sources close to the troubled savings and loan said Thursday. Cirona, 58, who formerly was the Western region's top S&L regulator, appeals to Great American's board because of his credibility with regulators, an important asset as the thrift remains under intense federal scrutiny amid massive losses.

Robert M. Bass Group, owners of American Savings Bank of Stockton, has joined the handful of investors known to be considering offers to buy troubled Great American Bank. Well-placed sources on both sides said Bass Group is "taking a look" at buying the San Diego-based savings and loan, which last week said it faces a possible seizure by regulators unless it can find a buyer or raise $350 million in capital by year-end.

In the mid-1980s, Great American Bank seemed to have it all going its way. Chairman Gordon Luce, a politically well connected and socially prominent Republican, had built the San Diego-based savings and loan into one of the industry's powerhouses. By the end of 1985, Luce had grown it to 117 branches and $8.2 billion in assets, up from three offices and $300 million in assets when he joined the thrift, then known as San Diego Federal, in 1969.

Great American Bank, announcing huge revised 1989 fourth-quarter and full-year losses that nearly rendered it insolvent, said on Tuesday that its days as an independent savings and loan may soon be over. The San Diego-based thrift, the nation's eighth largest, said it has asked its investment bankers to explore a "possible sale of the bank or merger with another financial institution." Some giant California banks expressed interest in acquiring the thrift.

Great American Bank, the nation's seventh-largest savings and loan, on Monday sought outside help in raising capital to meet federal standards--a move widely interpreted as posting a "for sale" sign on the San Diego institution. Sources close to Great American said it has already begun discussions with a number of investors and potential acquirers, including Wells Fargo Bank. Rumors also were rampant Monday of impending management changes at Great American.

Great American Bank disclosed Thursday that it expects to increase its fourth-quarter and full-year 1989 losses announced last month because its auditors have decided to extend their review of troubled loans in Arizona and elsewhere in the Southwest. The unusual announcement comes a week after the troubled San Diego-based thrift disclosed a fourth-quarter loss of $59.