Jan. 29--Every step in Sovereign Bancorp's history dating back at least to 2005 seems to have been attended by strong opinions on both sides, and Wednesday's shareholder vote on its sale to Banco Santander was no different.

P. Michael Ehlerman, Sovereign chairman, acknowledged that several shareholders at the event were "upset."

"I did talk to some people after the fact," Ehlerman said. "You're not going to make all the people happy all the time."

He defended the deal by saying that shareholders got a good price.

"Take a look at the upheaval in financial institutions that has occurred," he said. "The thing that's scary is that many of these institutions are still going down. I was a fairly large shareholder, for my net worth, and I did what I thought was right. We preserved some equity for the shareholders. That could easily have gone the other way and been nothing. Look at WaMu (Washington Mutual), where the shareholders got nothing. They were the only thrift bigger than we were. So there was an opinion that we needed to find a way to preserve some of the equity."

And, due to its 2005 agreement with Santander, Sovereign had to approach the Spanish bank fi rst.

"We could speculate that without that (the 2005 agreement) what would have happened," Ehlerman said. "But I got a question today as to whether we had any other offers from banks. I said no, we hadn't."

On the other hand, former Sovereign director Daniel K. Rothermel characterized the sale of Sovereign as being "a very sad day."

"Over the last couple years, shareholders lost $10 billion in market value," Rothermel said. "At the time about two years ago when Jay (Sidhu) resigned, the share price was in the $24 range; now it's in the $2 range. That's a signifi cant loss.

"I think also the community of Berks County is losing a very signifi cant community leader. Probably that will not be replicated by the new organization going forward."

Rothermel acknowledged that he was initially a supporter of Santander and continues to believe it's a fi ne organization.

"I supported their eventual acquisition of Sovereign, but I must say I don't support it at a giveaway price," he said, adding that he cast his votes against the deal Wednesday.

Although he recognizes the unusual pressure banks are under in the ongoing economic downturn, Rothermel said some, such as M&T Bank, have been able to survive.

"They kept their mind on what was important," he said.

When California-based Relational Investors began campaigning for change at Sovereign in 2005 and ultimately won board representation, Rothermel said, the direction changed from the long-term view to that of short-term profits -- which, ironically, did not come to pass.

"Those people ... didn't have any banking experience, and it takes a banker to run a bank," he said.

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