Irvine, Calif.-based Nano Financial Holdings Inc. has resubmitted an application for itself and Allegiant United Holdings LLC to become bank holding companies through Nano's acquisition of Commerce Bank Temecula Valley, Nano's lawyer confirmed.

The Federal Reserve Board of San Francisco returned the application Feb. 6. Nano Financial submitted a revised application Feb. 13, Nano's lawyer Gordon Bava, a partner at Manatt, Phelps & Phillips LLP, wrote in an emailed statement to S&P Global Market Intelligence.

Bava said the application was returned with a request to reorganize and reformat the responses for easier retrieval of information.

"In no way was this action a rejection of the application on the merits," he wrote.

He said Nano will provide any additional information regulators reasonably request. "Nano has no reason to believe that the application will not be approved in the usual and normal course because on the merits it is a strong application," Bava added.

A returned application is neither approved nor denied. Applications can be returned for technical deficiencies or as an indication regulators are lukewarm on the proposal. Returns are relatively rare: The Fed received 554 applications and returned two of them in the first six months of 2017.