CalFed Says It May Seek National Bank Charter : Thrifts: Company cites FDIC plan to bolster deposit insurance fund for savings and loans.

Following the lead of Great Western Financial Corp., California Federal Bank said Monday it is preparing to seek a national bank charter as a way to escape the high cost of federal deposit insurance for savings and loans.

CalFed’s action--on top of Great Western’s similar announcement last week--increases the threat that a plan to bolster the federal deposit insurance fund for savings and loans could unravel.

The Federal Deposit Insurance Corp., which oversees the separate funds for commercial banks and thrift institutions, has proposed slashing the deposit-insurance premium that banks pay to an average of 4.5 cents per $100 of deposits, from 23.5 cents now.

But because the savings and loan fund remains undercapitalized, the premium for thrift institutions would stay at 23.5 cents per $100 of deposits under the FDIC proposal, which could be adopted as early as next July. A large portion of the thrifts’ premium is diverted to pay interest on bonds issued several years ago to help resolve the savings and loan crisis.

“It’s obvious that we’ll be at a competitive disadvantage if we’re forced to pay six times the insurance premium that our commercial bank competitors are paying,” Edward G. Harshfield, CalFed president and chief executive, said in a statement Monday. He added that the surviving thrift institutions are no more responsible for the savings and loan mess than the banks are.

When Great Western announced Wednesday that it would seek national bank charters for California and Florida, analysts predicted that the action by the country’s second-largest thrift might spark a stampede out of the savings and loan deposit insurance fund.

CalFed, with deposits of $14.2 billion at the end of 1994, ranks as the country’s sixth-largest savings and loan.

Unlike Great Western, CalFed has not actually applied for the bank charter, which would require approval from the Federal Reserve Board and the Office of the Comptroller of the Currency. Spokesman Frank Moore said CalFed might reconsider the move if the FDIC backs away from its plan.

However, if CalFed were granted a bank charter, its plan would be to operate the bank within its existing savings and loan branches, much as Great Western has proposed.