American Savings Bailout May Be Renegotiated : Thrifts: Critics say the federally assisted buyout in 1988 was a giveaway. The RTC wants a new deal, and the company says it is willing to talk.

The federal Resolution Trust Corp., as part of a new Bush Administration initiative to cut the cost of the thrift bailout, said Friday that it will seek to renegotiate the government-assisted sale of American Savings & Loan in 1988.

The Robert M. Bass Group of Ft. Worth purchased insolvent American Savings in late 1988 with an estimated $2.7 billion in federal assistance. The deal was among a flurry of controversial sales of troubled thrifts in 1988 that critics have charged amounted to a federal giveaway.

Bolstered by the federal assistance, American Savings has been highly profitable for the Bass group, led by Texas billionaire Robert M. Bass. The thrift earned $214.2 million in 1989 and $174.7 million in the first nine months of last year.

The American Savings transaction is one of about 100 transactions that the RTC, the federal agency charged with overseeing the cleanup of the thrift industry, will try to renegotiate in the next several months, said agency spokesman Steve Katsanos.

A spokesman for the Bass group said American Savings is willing to listen to the government’s arguments. However, he could not say how willing officials would be to make changes in the 2-year-old agreement.

“Whenever they’re ready to sit down and talk about any points, we’re willing to do that,” said Owen Blicksilver, a spokesman for the Bass group.

The White House on Thursday gave the RTC authority to seek changes in the sales agreements of failed thrifts in 1988. The government hopes to obtain more favorable terms that will lower the cost of the thrift bailout and thus lower the cost to taxpayers.

Most of the government’s effort will be focused on the 96 transactions involved in the Southwest Plan, a strategy used by former regulators to merge 220 failed thrifts--mainly in Texas--into other thrifts, Katsanos said.

Amending various provisions in the transactions could cut at least $2 billion off the thrift industry’s cleanup cost. The RTC, mandated by federal law to review the 1988 deals, hired independent auditors to examine each transaction.

Katsanos said the agency is drawing up a list of priority cases--transactions that it could renegotiate during the next few months. Many of the deals were negotiated in the last few days of 1988, just ahead of the deadline for certain tax advantages for thrift buyers to expire.

In the last days of 1988, the Bass group provided $350 million and received about $2.7 billion in federal assistance to take over American Savings, then the nation’s largest S&L.;

In a unique transaction, American Savings was split into two entities: American Savings Bank, which holds the good assets, and New West Federal Savings & Loan, essentially a government thrift that holds the bad assets.

The American Savings Bank and a real estate management firm called American Real Estate Group were put under a holding company called N. A. Capital Holdings Inc. in Irvine.