Westlake Buys All Assets of Auto Lender Nicholas Financial

Auto finance company Westlake Financial is buying substantially all of the assets of rival Nicholas Financial Inc., according to a regulatory filing.

Westlake agreed to pay $65.6 million for the assets, which include auto loans and unsecured consumer loan contracts, according to the filing. It follows a restructuring that Nicholas announced a year ago, in which it scaled back operations and turned to a Westlake company for help servicing its existing auto loans. Nicholas Financial’s stock is up about 50% this week.

The deal marks the latest acquisition of auto loan portfolios by subsidiaries of Los Angeles-based Westlake ...