South Financial warned

The financially struggling parent of Carolina First Bank has been warned by Nasdaq Stock Market officials that its share price has fallen short of their listing requirements for too long.

The South Financial Group Inc. said Thursday that it was notified about the issue by letter on Dec. 4.

The Greenville-based company said its stock will continue to trade on the Nasdaq's primary exchange.

"This is a technical requirement of the Nasdaq stock market, and we'll likely have close to a year to resolve it," James Gordon, South Financial's chief financial officer, said in a statement. "We are actively monitoring our stock price and will consider multiple options to comply with Nasdaq's requirement."

At issue is a requirement that Nasdaq Stock Market-listed shares maintain a minimum bid price of $1 each.

South Financial's stock has fallen short of that mark for more than 30 consecutive business days, triggering the notification letter last Friday.

Pummeled by South Financial's real estate-related losses, the company's shares slipped under the $1 level around Oct. 22 and have gradually declined further since then. Within the past year, the stock has traded as high as $4.75.

The bank owner's shares ended Thursday at 55 cents. The latest bid price offered by buyers was 54 cents, according Yahoo Finance. South Financial's trading symbol is TSFG.

In statement released after U.S. markets had closed, the company said Thursday that it has at least 180 days to comply with the listing rules.

To do so, the company's common shares must trade at $1 or higher for 10 consecutive days by June 2. If not, they could be removed, or delisted. But South Financial could appeal or take other actions, such as switching to a Nasdaq-run exchange for smaller publicly traded companies.

As measured by the value of its outstanding shares, South Financial was for years the largest publicly traded bank owner headquartered in South Carolina. That title is now held by Columbia-based SCBT Financial Corp., which as of Thursday had a market capitalization value of about $344 million, compared with about $118 million at Carolina First's parent.

A mountain of bad real estate loans have triggered deep losses at South Financial. In October, the company said its third-quarter net loss widened to $340.8 million from $31.2 million in the year-earlier period. For the first nine months of 2009, losses totaled

$543 million, up from $249.4 million through Sept. 30, 2008.

The company has about $12.3 billion in assets and 177 branches in South Carolina, North Carolina and Florida.

Carolina First has about eight retail offices in the Charleston area and about $260 million in local deposits, for about 3 percent of the total as of June 30. The bank paid $2 million in 2008 for the naming rights to College of Charleston's basketball arena.

The Greenville News contributed to this report.