Connecticut

Once a hotbed of activity, the region has reported the fewest bank mergers since the financial crisis.

Vend Lease, which is based in Baltimore, focuses on suppliers and vendors in the hospitality industry.

PeoplesBancorp in Holyoke, Mass., has agreed to buy First Suffield Financial in Connecticut for $60 million.

The Connecticut company will have nearly $48 billion in assets after it buys First Connecticut Bancorp.

The company will snag its first branches in three towns in Connecticut and Rhode Island after buying locations from Webster Financial.

James Smith said his late enrollment in the state’s Republican Party meant he would be ineligible to be a candidate in its August primary and that he did not want to disrupt the nomination process.

James Smith said he would decide soon whether he’ll seek the Republican nomination for governor. He said he was inspired partly by his recent work on a commission tasked with recommending fixes to the state’s fiscal and economic problems.

Since stepping down as CEO of Webster Bank last month, James Smith has spent much of his time co-chairing a panel tasked with solving his home state’s fiscal and economic woes. Banks, and perhaps even fintechs, could be a part of its comeback story, he says.

Patriot National in Connecticut planned to build a regional small-business lending operation on its own — until it had a chance to buy a national platform.

Patriot National in Connecticut would become the latest community bank to ramp up small-business lending with its $81 million deal to acquire Hana Financial's much larger SBA lending unit.