| 23 September 2009

E*TRADE Financial Corporation (ETFC) announced today that it completed its common stock offering, raising $147 million after fees and commissions. It took a total of 80.2 million shares, sold at the market over the course of the last week, to reach their target amount. A total of $150 million was raised but roughly $3 million will go to fees and commissions.

As we reported last week, E*TRADE was told to shore up its banking unit last week by the Office of Thrift Supervision, their primary regulator, and add at least $100 million to its balance sheet.

The stock showed little selling pressure throughout the week and in fact the price increased slightly over the course of a week.

Still, the offering comes at a painful time for the organization. Shares in E*TRADE haven't traded above the $4 mark since July 2008. But the average sales price of $1.86 per share is still better than the low of $0.59 the share hit back in March of this year. Add to that the fact that E*TRADE's single largest investor, Citadel Investment Group, decided not to sell its stake in the company and one could suggest that things are starting to look up for the company.

The company has continued to add accounts and increase daily average trades and asset balances, despite a rough year. As the search is on for a new leader we suspect to see continued efforts to refocus the organization around its core brokerage unit and attempts to deflect the disaster that was the banking and mortgage business.