It was a family affair when First Citizens Financial Corp. of Mason City, Iowa, bought Kanabec Credit Co. of Mora, Minn., about 200 miles away.
The $773 million-asset First Citizens and the $113 million-asset Kanabec were majority owned by the family of First Citizens' chairman, O. Jay Tomson. So at the end of last year the companies merged through a stock exchange.
"It is just a matter of merging the two entities and having one stock certificate book instead of two," said Mr. Tomson, who bought Kanabec in 1973 when it was in trouble and turned it around.
The advantage of the merger is that the two companies' subsidiaries - the 11-branch First Citizens National Bank and the single-branch Kanabec State Bank - can save money by combining back-office operations, he said.
The banks' names, employees, and management will remain the same, but the holding company will use the First Citizens name, Mr. Tomson said. Richard D. Shultz, Kanabec's president, is Mr. Tomson's son-in-law.
