SOUTHEAST

Pacific Capital Bancorp in Santa Barbara, Calif., is buying First Bancshares Inc. in San Luis Obispo for $60.8 million in cash.

My Jan. 5 column on how banks can work with schools and colleges drew some useful suggestions from bankers.

Because its previous strategy of lending to insurance agencies around the country produced nothing but losses, a small Indiana thrift is taking a different tack.

Exchange National Bancshares Inc. of Jefferson City, Mo., is buying the $171 million-asset Bank 10 in Belton for $32 million.

First Merit Corp. of Akron said Tuesday that it had revised its fourth-quarter and full-year earnings to reflect a $3.8 million impairment charge on $25 million of preferred stock in Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac.

Paul Tobias met James C. Bess last spring and says he was so impressed with what the executive had done to fix the troubled North Country Bank in Manistique, Mich., that he decided to buy it.

Hudson City Bancorp of Paramus, N.J., expects to raise $3.5 billion to $4.7 billion in its second-step conversion to a 100% stock-traded company.

Small community banks are going private at an increasingly rapid rate, and most cite regulatory compliance costs as the primary factor behind the trend.

The National Credit Union Administration is asking Congress to approve new capital requirements for credit unions.

Greene County Bancshares Inc. was an also-ran in Tennessee when it opened its first metropolitan branch in Knoxville 14 months ago, with modest growth plans that called for adding a couple of branches a year.

Grant Thornton's 12th annual survey of community bank executives found that newer regulations are causing these bankers to shift priorities and reconsider ownership structures.

Hudson United Bancorp in Mahwah, N.J., has rejected suggestions that its decision to close the accounts of an Islamic school in Union City, N.J., was motivated by religious bias.

John R. Cochran, the chairman and chief executive of FirstMerit Corp. of Akron, says this will be its breakout year.

National Penn Bancshares Inc. released details Wednesday of a scheme perpetrated by one of its employees that affected roughly 85 customers.

Integrity Financial Corp. of Hickory, N.C., has retained McColl Partners LLC, the Charlotte investment banking firm founded by Bank of America Corp.'s former chairman, to explore "strategic alternatives."

After a two-year battle concerning whistleblower protection, the Department of Labor has ordered Cardinal Bankshares Inc. of Floyd, Va., to reinstate its former chief financial officer, David Welch.