Liberty Financial Services Inc. of Sioux City, Iowa, plans to acquire Valley Bank, an Elk Point, S.D., unit of Haugo Bancshares Inc. of Sioux Falls.

Surety Bank in Fort Worth, which has been riddled with troubles in recent years, has a definitive agreement to sell itself to First Graham Bancorp Inc. for about $8.7 million, or $3 million above equity.

Click here to see the top 150 community banks with the largest consumer and industrial loan portfolios.

BankAtlantic Bancorp Inc. of Fort Lauderdale, Fla., said Monday that it would use the proceeds from its sale of Stifel Financial Corp. stock to establish a subsidiary that would house and acquire the parent's nonaccruing loans.

TierOne Corp. of Lincoln, Neb., announced late Thursday that its board has terminated its planned sale to CapitalSource Inc., a Chevy Chase, Md., real estate investment trust.

Another group of wealthy Texans is buying up community banks.

Leesport Financial Corp. of Wyomissing, Pa., has changed its name to Vist Financial Corp. and said all its divisions will operate under that name.

First Financial Corp. of Elizabethtown, Ky., plans to acquire FSB Bancshares Inc. in Lanesville, Ind., for $14 million in cash.

Greater Community Bancorp's deal to sell itself to Oritani Financial Corp. had left investors in both companies so dissatisfied that executives feared it might fail to win shareholder approval.

Past generations have seen all this before. That is why for nearly three decades the Independent Community Bankers of America has warned that our financial system was becoming dangerously over-concentrated and that there would be ruinous consequences.

Capital Corp. of the West of Merced, Calif., is looking for a new chief executive officer and has hired an investment bank to help it evaluate its strategic options.

MIDDLE ATLANTIC

With southwest Florida's battered real estate market not expected to recover until at least 2009, TIB Financial Corp. in Naples has picked a good time to expand into the wealth management business.

Shares of Capital Corp. of the West lost more than half their value Wednesday after the Merced, Calif., company warned that it expects to report a fourth-quarter loss of $15 million and that it would miss a deadline for filing the results because of "material weaknesses" found in its lending and accounting functions.

The Small Business Administration has given its standard operating procedure handbook an extreme makeover as part of its mission to make its loan programs easier to use.

Several years ago Pennsylvania Rep. Dwight Evans championed an initiative to bring grocery stores to low-income neighborhoods across the state, and now he hopes to do the same with banks.

Shares of Beverly Hills Bancorp Inc. plunged Tuesday after the Calabasas, Calif., company announced that it had lost $6.6 million in the fourth quarter, and that it would preserve its capital instead of paying cash dividends.

The Maryland Senate approved legislation that would let state-chartered banks collect fees they initially waived if borrowers prepay their mortgages or home equity loans.

While community bankers accept that the Federal Reserve Board's indirect rescue of Bear Stearns Cos. was necessary to calm financial markets, some are worried about broader implications.