WASHINGTON- The Federal Reserve Board has given its blessing to BankAmerica Corp., plan to acquire Continental Bank Corp. of Chicago.
BankAmerica, the second-largest bank hold- ing company in the Untied States with $197.2 billion of assest, will grow to $220 billion of assets as a result of the merger.
Continental is the natin's 34th-largest bank holding company.
$8.9 Billion of Deposits
The acquisition will give San Francisco based BankAmerica control of Continental Bank, the Chicago concern's lead bank, a trust company, and a number of other lending units.
The acquisiton will give BankAmerica control of $8.9 billion of Illinois deposits, nearly 6.5% of the state's total deposits in commercial banks.
The board, before giving its approval, reviewed the two institutions' Community Reinvestment Act records.
Community-Group Charges
The board rejected charges from community groups who said that the two institutions do not live up to their CRA obligations.
The acquisition is not yet complete. The Federal Reserve condititoned its approval on BankAmerica's receipt of all required approvals from California and Illinois state banking regulators.
