Bridge Capital Holdings, the San Jose, Calif.-based parent company of Bridge Bank and a December 2008 recipient of $23.9 million in TARP money, said it is ready to repay the government and leave the program.

The company plans to redeem all of the preferred stock that it sold to the Treasury Department in 2008.  It said it has procured all necessary regulatory approvals to complete its departure.

Bridge Capital has paid more than $2.4 million to the U.S. government over the life of its participation in TARP's Capital Purchase Program.  According to the company's press statement, it also intends to repurchase the common stock warrants that it issued to the Treasury in the initial transaction.

Those warrants cover 396,412 shares of Bridge Capital's common stock.  No definitive agreement on the repurchase price has been reached.

Daniel P. Myers, Bridge Capital's chief executive officer, called the redemption of the TARP shares a significant milestone for the company.  "We believe [this] reflects the strength of our balance sheet and our ability to continue actively meeting the financing needs of our growing Silicon Valley customer base." 

The subsidiary, Bridge Bank, is a full-service business bank catering to small, medium and emerging technology companies.    

Bridge Capital raised more than $30 million in capital through a stock placement last November. The company said at the time that it intended to use part of that money to redeem its TARP shares.