A reader shared this view of news coverage of Central Pacific Bank this week, which happened to be the week that the bank’s stock hit what may be an all-time low of $3.67 per share, down from over $20 per share less than a year ago.

Central Pacific Bank mounts a lobby exhibit of things available from the 100th/442nd clubhouses. Local newspapers go big. why?

Well, obviously, it promotes Dan Inouye and Sakae Takahashi as bank founders and wants to say it’s a real local bank for local people.

DOESN”T say (in PR releases) that haole CEO Clinton Arnoldus came in and invested in Mainland properties that went bigtime south… Arnoldus now gone and Ron Migita (the former head of City Bank who took a buy-out after the two banks merged) is back in charge.

look, here’s the story. Local CPB (Sen. Sakae Takahasi’s baby) got acquired by the Mainland dude Arnoldus and if you look at the stats, it failed ands now pays no dividend.

and it’s THE ONLY ONE of our local banks requiring a federal stimulus balout (FACT)

so it does a lobby exhibit … U.S. Attorney For Hawaii Ed Kubo attends…

hello?

From the bank’s point of view, it truly is trying to send a legitimate public relations message that it is attempting to return to its local roots with an attention-grabbing exhibit that appears to have nothing to do with the bank’s financials, but really says a lot about its condition.

Off topic, perhaps, but I was interested to see that CPF insiders have been buying stock as the price has been sliding, trying to signal their confidence in the company’s prospects.

I may disagree with the reader’s comments somewhat, as I’m not sure that every news report has to review it’s record losses of the past year or more. But when does narrow coverage of a story like this become boosterism rather than news, keeping in mind the backdrop of lax coverage of the banking sector, as well as the broader issue of the poor overall business coverage we’ve gotten used to, at least in the daily media.

For example, Hawaiian Electric, one of the state’s largest employers, has lost 40 percent of its stock value in the past month, falling from $22 to just over $12 with very little reporting. What’s happened? Is the company being dragged down by its banking business? By Hawaii’s economic slowdown? By its green initiatives? Who’s hurting as a result of the plummeting stock price? What about those dividends? And Hawaiian Electric isn’t the only recent casualty you haven’t read about. What about Bank of Hawaii, with stock down 50 percent in recent months? Local business reporting is lagging way behind.

Did you notice this NY Times story yesterday reporting how much house you can buy in various cities for $375,000? In Minneapolis, it’s an older four bedroom house in an okay location. In Hawaii, despite moderately lower prices recently, the closest comparable I found is this 864 square foot house being sold “as is”, with “street parking only” in beautiful downtown Palama, between King Street and the freeway (if that Google Maps link works).

If you haven’t seen it yet, you might want to check out this video interview with Rod Thompson as he closed down the Star-Bulletin’s Big Island bureau at the end of February.

We retrieved Leo’s carrier from VCA last evening. It had been the last thing on our minds when we walked out of there on Friday morning. Tomorrow is another Feline Friday. I’m trying to get “up” for it.