Union Bank of California is buying bank holding company Pacific Capital, in one of the largest bank deals in years.

In what would be its largest acquisition in more 15 years, UnionBanCal Corp. in San Francisco is buying Pacific Capital Corp. in Santa Barbara, Calif., for about $1.5 billion in cash.

For a second time in three weeks, regulators have shuttered a bank that others were unwilling to acquire.

Pennsylvania's capital city of Harrisburg, reporting that two-thirds of 44 loans made under the city's small business loan program are delinquent, expects to soon announce the name of a collection agency that will chase the outstanding loans "at no charge".

Buyers' stock has outperformed after about two-thirds of major deal announcements over the last nine months, hinting at a shift from the displeasure acquirers met with in late 2010 and early 2011.

WASHINGTON — The Office of the Comptroller of the Currency has approved Capital One Financial Corp.'s acquisition of HSBC Bank USA's credit card portfolio.

PNC Financial Services Group Inc. intends to open as many 60 branches and will substantially increase its sales force this year as it looks to strengthen its presence in the Southeast and take advantage of market disruption to add new clients throughout its 15-state footprint.

Prices fell and the pace of dealmaking slowed last month, but March started off strong with another big deal in Texas.

Many private-equity firms hoped to capitalize on the financial crisis through two waves of bank investments. The first, in 2007-8, focused on large investments in major banks. These disappointing investments were too early as industry conditions worsened dragging down these investments.

Richard Hendrix, the president and CEO of FBR & Co., says that earnings and price expectations must "reset" for capital to come back to banks. In a wide-ranging Q&A, he discussed bankers' reluctant to tap capital markets and his belief that it could take time before a meaningful level of IPOs take place.

To create a mobile banking offering that can compete with banks or the likes of Google, the prepaid card marketer Green Dot is purchasing the location-based deals company Loopt.

The prepaid card marketer Green Dot said Friday that it agreed to buy the location-based deals company Loopt.

Three years ago, the Seattle bank was struggling mightily with bad loans and diminishing capital. A recently completed IPO put $96 million back into the bank, putting it on the path to recovery.

FDIC objected to private equity deal involving Prosperity Bank Co. in St. Augustine, Fla., sources said. It had served as a model for a good bank/bad bank deal involving BankAtlantic that a judge recently blocked.

Discover Financial Services has signed a deal with the National Payments Corporation of India, in the credit card company's latest effort to increase card acceptance abroad by teaming up with local networks.

Joseph Stilwell is trying to gain seats on the mutual holding company's board with the solitary goal of getting the management team to sell.

West Virginia Attorney General Darrell McGraw's office sued two divisions of Encore Capital Group, claiming the firms participated in fraudulent collections and used false affidavits in lawsuits.

First Citizens BancShares Inc. in Raleigh, N.C., reported only modest earnings growth in 2011 as income gains from failed-bank acquisitions were largely offset by higher loss provisions related to loans it inherited in those deals.

Cloud-based compliance and data-security provider Trustwave soon will add Web security to its portfolio through the acquisition of M86 Security, an Irvine, Calif.-based provider of advanced antimalware technology.

Cadence Bancorp's offer of 2.4 times tangible book value for Houston's Encore Bancshares has revived hopes that the M&A is coming back.