Strategic planning

The Honolulu-based utility sold a 90.1% stake in American Savings Bank. The deal valued the lender at $450 million.

Transactions grew larger and more frequent this year. As a result, aggregate value more than tripled from 2023 and topped $15 billion.

The Pennsylvania-based buyer said it would pick up nearly $350 million of assets and a commercial-focused loan portfolio as part of the $54.6 million deal.

The Federal Reserve and OCC approved the company's plan to buy Independent Bank Group in Texas, putting the deal on track to close early next year as expected. In an atmosphere of M&A delays for banks, the deal is on a relatively smooth path.

The combination would create a Northeast regional bank with nearly $24 billion of assets. It would rank as the eighth-largest bank in the Boston metropolitan area by deposit market share.

The Long Island bank is the latest financial institution to use new equity to restructure its balance sheet and unload low-yielding assets. Its stock price tumbled after the shares were priced at a considerable discount.

The bank said it redeployed proceeds from the sale into high-yielding investments. It also said it would end an employee pension plan to curb expenses.

The Dallas bank has spent the last three years building itself into a new company. Now, it has to prove the investments will pay off.

The Canadian bank's stateside retail operations will be hamstrung by a massive anti-money-laundering settlement. But executives said the company can lean on both its Wall Street business and lines of revenue north of the border.

After the bank's 2014 spinoff from Royal Bank of Scotland, its executives worked to shore up weaknesses. Now they're concentrating on how to close the gap with regional banking peers.