Three regional banks released their quarterly and 2008 earnings reports today: Rainier Pacific, Columbia and Frontier.

I’ll be listening to conference calls from Frontier and Columbia, and I’ll report what I hear, but here’s the basics of today’s releases.

Columbia:
Net income of $1.8 million for the quarter, compared to $7.3 million for the same quarter in 2007. The results a loan loss provision of $13.3 million plus an additional impairment of $1 million due to the continuing decline of investments in Freddie Mac and Fannie Mae.

Net income for the year was $6 million, compared to $32.4 million in 2007.

Nonperforming assets were $109.6 million at the end of the year, compared to $78.2 million at the end of September and $14.6 million at then end of 2007

Frontier:
Net loss of $89.5 for the quarter compared to income of $18 million the year before. Contributing to the loss were a $77.1 million noncash impairment charge to goodwill and a $44.4 million provision for loan losses.

For the year - a net loss of $89.7 million, compared to a net income of $73.9 million for 2007.

Nonperforming assets at the end of the year were $446 million, or 10.87 percent of total assets. This compares to $208.9 million, or 4.9 percent of total assets at the end of September.

Most non-performing loans were residential, 42 percent, and land development, 41 percent.

Rainier Pacific:
Net loss of $2 million for the quarter compared to net income of $910,000 for the same quarter in 2007. For the year, Rainier Pacific saw a loss of $2.5 million compared to net income of $3.9 million in 2007.

The quarterly loss was due in most part to a pre-tax impairment of $2.8 million related to holdings of securities and a higher loan loss provision.

Like the other banks, Rainier Pacific explained the weak numbers much in terms of the slowdown in the residential housing market.

I’ll be updating this report later this afternoon. Right now, on the market: Columbia stock is down 31 cents to $9.45, Rainier Pacific is down 5 cents to $1.53 and Frontier has slipped more than 21 percent, down 60 cents to $2.20.

The Internal Revenue Service Taxpayer Assistance Center in Tacoma is expanding its service for taxpayers eligible for the Earned Income Tax Credit.

The center will increase its outreach by opening for three upcoming Saturdays – Jan. 31, Feb. 7 and 21. The extra hours are being added, according to an IRS release, to help potentially eligible taxpayers who may not be able to seek assistance during the work week.

EITC is a credit that can result in a refund of more than $4,800 for some taxpayers. Taxpayers with an income of less than $41,646 may be eligible, depending on their filing status.

Last year, over 3.2 million individuals filed tax returns in Washington, and of those, over 364,000 were eligible for the EITC – receiving a total of over $654 million, according to the IRS.

For a list of opening hours at centers in the state, visit www.irs.gov/localcontacts or, in Tacoma, call 253-428-3518. For information about the nearest free tax assistance center, call 800-906-9887.

Alaska Air Group today released results for its fourth quarter and full year that are either distressing or encouraging, depending on how you view them.

Alaska Air Group, parent company of SeaTac's Alaska Airlines and Horizon Air, either showed a $16.4 million profit for the quarter or a $75.4 million loss.

The difference is what accountants call "special items," expense and income items that occurred during the quarter because of special, infrequent occurrences such as radical shifts in oil prices, corporate restructuring and the unscheduled retirement of uneconomic jets.

The company, in its corporate earnings release, led with the $75.2 million loss, but quickly followed with news of the $16.4 million profit.

Wall Street apparently took the positive view. Alaska Air Group shares rose 95 cents or 3.57 percent Thursday to close at $27.56.

Alaska Air's chairman, Bill Ayer, emphasized the profit:

"In a year of unprecedented volatility that included soaring fuel prices and an economic meltdown, we were pleased to eke out a small profit for 2008, excluding special items, and be one of only a few major airlines to do so," he said in a prepared statement.

Chief gremlin in this good news-bad news scenario were oil prices that rocketed upward to $147 a barrel in midsummer and then quickly fell to the mid-$30-a-barrel by December.

Airlines trying to guard against predicted oil prices of as high as $200 a barrel bought options or hedges to protect themselves from that contingency only to see oil prices free fall below their hedge values.

Even airlines such as Southwest and Alaska, which had played the oil price game successfully for years accruing benefits to their bottom lines, got caught in the quirky and unusual behavior.

At Alaska, the oil price fluctuations brought these after-tax charges in the fourth quarter: mark-to-market fuel hedge adjustments of $50.3 million and realized losses because of the early termination of fuel hedges for 2009 and 2010 of $31.3 million.

Passenger demand and pricing also went unpredictable in 2008. The year began with steady demand that allowed airlines including Alaska to steadily raise prices step-by-step through mid-year. Then the banking and economic crisis sent business travel down the drain in the later months of the year and frightened leisure travelers into canceling trips.

This whipsaw effect sent prices tumbling again.

At Alaska, mainline passenger traffic declined in the fourth quarter by 4.4 percent, but the company moved quickly and cut capacity more quickly by 7.1 percent.

The result was fuller planes in the fourth quarter of 2008 compared with the same quarter in 2007. The percentage of seats filled increased by 2.3 percentage points to 77 percent in the fourth quarter.

Stock market and investment declines and instability made major changes in the airline holding company's debt-to-capital ratio, which increased to 81 percent at year's end compared with 70 percent at the end of 2007.

Alaska attributed much of that change to an increase in the company's unfunded pension liability which increased some $300 million because of a decline in the value of the pension plan's assets.

Ayer told analysts that in today's difficult times, the airline holding company's guiding principle will be old fashioned common sense.

"If I had to sum up the principles that we've been adhering to and that will guide our future decisions, they would sound a lot like something your parents or grandparents probably taught you: Don't buy things you can't afford, don't borrow money you can't pay back, don't agree to things you don't understand, and finally, if it doesn't seem right, it probably isn't," Ayer said Thursday.