AmericanWest Bank in Spokane, Wash., is deepening its presence in California with plans to acquire Security Business Bank of San Diego.

Alliance Data Systems (ADS) has renewed a long-term agreement to manage the private-label credit card program for luxury goods retailer Little Switzerland, according to an announcement Tuesday.

If TAG is allowed to expire at yearend, it could spur community banks looking for extra liquidity to turn back to FHLB advances, which are at their lowest point in a decade.

Provident New York Bancorp (PBNY) in Montebello has added its fifth commercial banking team in the New York City market since January.

CenterState Banks (CSFL) in Davenport, Fla.., is looking to slim down after spending much of the last three years bulking up through acquisitions.

Meta Financial Group (CASH) of Storm Lake, Iowa, has agreed to pay $2.1 million to settle a class-action lawsuit with investors related its former high-interest, small-balance loan program, iAdvance.

Barry Sloane of Newtek Business Services says his small-merchant clients are reaping little benefit from the cap on debit interchange fees.

HSBC's residential lending and servicing business continues to be under what the bank calls a "strategic review," leaving its mortgage workers in limbo.

The National Reverse Mortgage Lenders Association has raised the possibility of creating a hybrid reverse mortgage loan with members of the White House staff, Peter Bell, its president and CEO told attendees at the group's eastern regional meeting in New York.

The Department of Housing and Urban Development has ordered AmericaHomeKey, Inc., to immediately stop making FHA-insured mortgages and fined the Dallas-based lender $268,000.

Capital Bank Financial, a Miami company formed two years ago to buy distressed banks in the Southeast, has struck a deal to acquire Southern Community Financial (SCMF) in Winston-Salem, N.C., for $48.4 million.

No one can ever accuse Steve Huston of being a heartless banker. Huston, the owner of Bankwest Financial in Rockford, Minn., resuscitated Dr. Frank Anderson during a pickup basketball game in January, a local Fox News affiliate reported last week.

Mortgage delinquencies on single-family homes declined in February, snapping a five-month streak of increases, according to a monthly report from Freddie Mac.

The other morning I was at the counter of the local UPS store notarizing a document when I was shocked by a comment by a woman standing nearby. This nationwide franchise provides post office boxes, packing, shipping, copying and many other individual and business-related services through 4,700 convenient small corner or mini-mall stores. My head snapped as she told the clerk, "I would like to make a deposit." At first I thought she was making a deposit for a purchase or on a bill or perhaps depositing a package of goods for shipping.

CHEYENNE, Wyo. – Warren FCU is hunting for a new site after yesterday’s announcement that Main Street Market is closing the only grocery store in nearby Wellington, Colo., and with it an in-store branch of the credit union.

IMGCAP(1)]

IMGCAP(1)]

James Gutierrez, founder of micro-lender Progreso Financiero, is leaving the company to start a new firm that will offer cloud-based payments for the unbanked, he told American Banker.

BankAtlantic Bancorp (BBX) said in a regulatory filing that it will change its name to BBX Capital as part of its deal to sell its thrift to BB&T (BBT) in Winston-Salem, N.C.

American Express Co. (AXP), the largest credit-card lender by spending, is raising its quarterly dividend 11% to 20 cents per share, its first increase since November 2007.