EverBank Merges Into WaFd in $3.9 Billion Deal to Build $75 Billion Regional Bank

EverBank Financial and WaFd disclosed a definitive merger agreement on September 7, and the numbers do most of the talking.

According to Reuters, <cite index="22-1">Florida-based EverBank Financial has agreed to acquire WaFd, a smaller bank in the Pacific Northwest, in a $3.9 billion reverse merger transaction.</cite> The legal wrapper is unconventional: <cite index="19-4">EverBank will merge into WaFd, with the latter remaining a publicly traded company after changing its name to EverBank Financial Corp and trading under the new ticker symbol EVBK on the Nasdaq.</cite> In plain terms, WaFd keeps the listing while EverBank's shareholders capture the majority of the equity.

<cite index="19-5">Upon completion of the transaction, EverBank investors will collectively own about 59.2% of the pro forma combined company, with WaFd shareholders owning the remaining 40.8%.</cite> At the bank level, <cite index="20-7">WaFd Bank, a federally insured Washington state chartered commercial bank, will merge with and into EverBank, N.A., a national banking association, with EverBank continuing as the bank chartered by the Office of the Comptroller of the Currency.</cite>

The combined institution would be a meaningful step up in scale. <cite index="26-5">The result carries roughly $75 billion in assets, $59 billion in deposits and more than 250 financial centers.</cite> That puts it inside the top 50 U.S. banks by assets, a tier where operating leverage starts to matter in ways it can't for a $35 billion standalone.

The deal rationale offered by management is the familiar mid-tier banking argument: get bigger or get squeezed. What the companies are projecting is more specific. According to a joint statement reviewed by the Wall Street Journal, <cite index="19-6">the merger is projected to increase WaFd's 2027 earnings per share by roughly 29% and recoup tangible book value dilution in less than two years.</cite> For WaFd's public shareholders, that earn-back period is the number to watch, since they're taking real dilution today in exchange for a promise about 2027 accretion. Both the Fed and the OCC will need to sign off: <cite index="26-6">closing is expected in early 2027, pending Federal Reserve and OCC approval and a vote by WaFd shareholders.</cite>

One analyst angle worth watching involves funding costs. EverBank built its franchise partly on higher-rate online deposits, while WaFd carries a more traditional, lower-cost deposit base. <cite index="20-8">The transaction is expected to result in significantly improved profitability for the combined pro-forma company, with a return on tangible common equity of approximately 15% after full realization of expected cost synergies.</cite> That 15% ROTCE target is a forward projection, contingent on synergies that haven't been extracted yet. The gap between EverBank's funding cost and WaFd's cheaper deposit base is the practical mechanism the combined team will need to manage.

Regulatory timing is the real variable. The companies are targeting early 2027, but bank mergers of this size move at the pace of their examiners. A proxy statement for WaFd's shareholder vote has yet to be filed with the SEC, which means the formal process clock hasn't started. Investors pricing in the synergy story are getting ahead of a regulatory review that could stretch or narrow the projected earn-back window in ways neither management team controls.

Sources cited:
- Reuters / CNBC (https://www.cnbc.com/2026/09/08/everbank-to-combine-with-wafd-in-3point9-billion-reverse-merger-.html)
- EverBank press release (PRNewswire via Yahoo Finance) (https://finance.yahoo.com/markets/stocks/articles/wafd-inc-enters-3-9-210000385.html)
- WaFd Bank investor press release (PDF) (https://www.wafdbank.com/documents/financial-news/2026/wafd-bank-press-release-20260907.pdf)
- Business Model Analyst (https://businessmodelanalyst.com/everbank-wafd-reverse-merger-deposit-cost/)