United States Bank Mergers & Acquisitions (BB&T)

 

A BB&T office in Greensboro, North Carolina. 

Photo credit: Warren LeMay. You can see more of his photos via this link: https://www.flickr.com/photos/warrenlemay

BB&T (Branch Banking & Trust)

BB&T traces its origins to eastern North Carolina in the aftermath of the American Civil War (1861 to 1865) during which the area was struggling to recover and rebuild from the devastation of four years of bloody fighting between the Union and Confederacy forces. Countless lives were lost, and the livelihoods of those who survived were often ruined. Many families were physically and emotionally torn across both geographical and ideological battle lines. The economy, along with many farms and towns, and businesses and homes suffered catastrophic damages. The end of the Civil War unfortunately did not mean the end of the divisiveness, distrust and political and personal resentments.

Against, or perhaps one should say despite this hardship, Alpheus Branch, the son of a wealthy planter in Halifax County, moved to Wilson County and eventually married Nannie Barnes, the daughter of prominent figure General Joshua Barnes and one of Wilson’s early founders. Alpheus Branch launched a mercantile business called Branch & Co. and he became acquainted with Thomas Jefferson Hadley, another important local leader. In 1872, Alpheus Branch and Thomas Jefferson Hadley joined forces and launched a private bank named Branch & Hadley. The new concern accepted deposits and made loans to local planters and businesses. The U.S. Southeast by the 1880s had returned to rising prosperity, as the traditional crop of cotton was supplemented by the new cash crop of tobacco. In 1887, Mr. Branch bought out his partner’s interests and Branch & Hadley became Branch & Co., Bankers.

Then in 1889, Alpheus Branch, his father-in-law Gen. Joshua Barnes, Branch’s old business partner Thomas Jefferson Hadley, along with J.F. Bruton, R. L. Thompson and Walter Brodie were granted a state charter from the North Carolina legislature to establish the Wilson Banking & Trust Co. The original intention of the new business was to offer banking, trustee and custodian services but a legislation change prevented the banking concern from actually carrying out its trust business until 1907.

Meanwhile, Alpheus Branch had died in 1893 and in 1900, his private bank Branch & Co., Bankers was incorporated into the Branch Banking Co., holder of the state charter and successor to the Wilson Banking & Trust Co. following two name changes. In 1913 – some six years after the launch of the trust services, Branch Banking Co. changed its name to Branch Banking & Trust Co., or BB&T for short.

In comparison with Europe, mainland United States escaped World War I physically unscathed and enjoyed a booming economy in the 1910s and 1920s. During this time, Branch Banking & Trust earned the reputation as one of the larger and stronger banks in North Carolina. The bank also expanded into the insurance and mortgage loan markets in 1922 and 1923 respectively.

When America’s over exuberance collapsed in 1929, the ensuing stock market crash and Great Depression caught many ordinary people and businesses big and small off-guard. Between January 1930 and January 1932 alone, well over 100 banks in North Carolina went bankrupt when their borrowers defaulted on their loans. As panics set in, bank runs saw the public transferring their deposits from Wilson’s seven other banks to the government-run United States Postal Savings System. What many didn’t know was that the postal savings system was not a bank on its own per se, but simply re-deposited the funds to designated banks. In Wilson County’s case, the postal savings’ banker was none other than Branch Banking & Trust. Thus, while Wilson’s other banks collapsed, BB&T enjoyed the confidence of government officials and remained financially healthy. As a matter of fact, as hundreds of banks failed in North Carolina between 1929 and 1933, BB&T’s network grew from five to eleven branches, and total assets increased almost threefold. 

The 1930s slump then came to an abrupt end when World War II broke out in 1939, as wartime demand for military machinery and foods trumped other concerns. Notwithstanding its massive tolls to lives, properties and the environment elsewhere, the global conflict lifted the American economy, employment and prosperity. A combination of patriotism and war-time restrictions on the production of non-war-related civilian consumer goods also caused personal savings to rise steadily, as things were just generally not available for sale. When peace returned in 1945, the returning soldiers and a massive influx of immigrants from war-torn Europe and other parts of the world to the U.S. led to a sharp increase in the demand for consumer goods, automobiles, machinery, infrastructure construction, housing, food staples, and consumer and business services – in other words – everything.

BB&T rode on this unprecedented post-WWII growth and the height of the so-called “American century” so that by the end of the 1960s, it ran a network of 60 branches in 35 cities in North Carolina. Legislative changes in the 1980s and 1990s slowly loosened up inter-state banking restrictions in the U.S., and by 1994, BB&T’s network numbered over 260 branches across both North and South Carolina. By this time, BB&T was the fourth largest bank in its home state.

In late 1994, BB&T Financial Corp. and Winston-Salem-based Southern National Corp. (fifth largest bank in North Carolina) agreed to merge in a deal that was valued at USD $2.2-billion. The combined bank became the largest bank in terms of deposits in North Carolina and the No. 3 in South Carolina with over 430 branches, including a small operation in Virginia. This merger also led to the new bank transferring its headquarters from Wilson to Winston-Salem, the home base of Southern National Corp. In 1996, Southern National took over United Carolina Bancshares Corp. for USD $985-million. United Carolina had a network of 153 branches across North and South Carolinas. The following year, Southern National resurrected and renamed itself BB&T Corp.

During the rest of the 1990s and the early 2000s, BB&T continued to expand outside of its stronghold in the Carolinas, buying up numerous regional and community banks one by one but yet building up an ever-increasing presence in Virginia, West Virginia, Maryland, Washington DC, Georgia and Tennessee. Some of the more significant takeovers (those valued at at least USD $200-million, or those that represented entry to a new market) are listed below.

Recent transactions:

• Between December 1997 and February 1998, BB&T bought Franklin Bancorporation of Washington, D.C. (for USD $165-million) and Maryland Federal Bancorp (USD $265-million). This marked BB&T’s first forays into the wealthy capital city area.
• In August 1998, BB&T acquired two financial institutions in Virginia: MainStreet Financial Corp. of Martinsville for USD $554-million and stockbroker Scott & Stringfellow Financial Inc. of Richmond for USD $131-million. MainStreet operated 46 branches in Virginia and three in Maryland.
• In January 1999, BB&T bought Mason-Dixon Bancshares Inc. of Westminster in Maryland for USD $257-million. The bank had 38 offices in the state.
• Also in January 1999, BB&T took over First Citizens Corp. of Newnan for USD $126-million. While the transaction was small, it became BB&T’s first entry into the state of Georgia with a network of 14 offices in south metropolitan Atlanta.
• In April 1999, BB&T purchased First Liberty Financial Corp. of Macon for USD $500-million. The purchase gave BB&T a network of 52 branches in the Macon and Savannah areas of Georgia.
• In what was its third acquisitions in Georgia in 1999, BB&T took over Premier Bancshares Inc. for USD $624-million in July. Premier had 42 branches in Atlanta and Northern Georgia.
• In July 2000, BB&T acquired FCNB Corp. of Frederick for USD $226-million. FCNB ran 34 offices in the central Maryland-Washington, D.C. corridor.
• Also in July 2000, BB&T purchased One Valley Bancorp Inc. of Charleston for USD $1.13-billion. The acquisition gave BB&T a network of 77 branches in West Virginia and another 48 in Virginia.
• In August 2000, BB&T took over BankFirst Corp. of Knoxville for USD $150-million. The small purchase was BB&T’s first entry into the state of Tennessee.
• In June 2001, BB&T bought Century South Banks Inc. of Alpharetta for USD $467-million. In doing so BB&T gained 40 offices in Georgia, North Carolina, Tennessee and Alabama.
• In August 2001, BB&T took over F&M National Corp. of Winchester. The holding company operated 174 branches and offices providing banking, mortgage, insurance and trust services in the Historic Triangle area of Virginia, Richmond and the metropolitan Washington, D.C. area.
• In November 2001, BB&T acquired MidAmerica Bancorp of Louisville in Kentucky for USD $415-million. MidAmerica operated 30 branches mainly through its Bank of Louisville subsidiary.
• Also in November 2001, BB&T took over AREA Bancshares Corp. for USD $451-million. AREA had 72 branches in Kentucky.
• In May 2002, BB&T bought Regional Financial Corp. (First South Bank) of Tallahassee for USD $275-million. First South Bank operated 22 offices in Tallahassee and the Florida Panhandle, Jacksonville, and along the Gulf Coast from Beverly Hills to Naples.
• In January 2003, BB&T made a big expansion in Virginia when it acquired First Virginia Banks Inc. for USD $3.38-billion. First Virginia’s subsidiaries operated 364 branches in total: 298 in Virginia, 55 in Maryland and 11 in northeast Tennessee.
• In April 2004, BB&T took over Republic Bancshares Inc. St. Petersburg for USD $392-million, gaining a network of 71 branches in Southeast Florida.
• In December 2005, BB&T acquired Main Street Banks Inc. of Atlanta for USD $623-million. Main Street Banks had 29 banking and insurance offices in Atlanta and Athens, Georgia.
• In December 2006, BB&T took over Coastal Financial Corporation of Myrtle Beach for USD $395-million. It had 17 branches in greater Myrtle Beach and seven in greater Wilmington, South Carolina.
• In June 2009, BB&T repaid the U.S. government the USD $3.1-billion that it received under the Troubled Asset Relief Program (TARP) after regulators determined the bank was well capitalized.
• In August 2009 during the global credit crisis that started in 2008, Colonial Bank of Montgomery failed and was shut down by the Alabama State Banking Department and the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation (FDIC). In a brokered agreement with the FDIC, BB&T took control of all Colonial Bank’s 346 branches and USD $20-billion of client deposits in Alabama, Florida, Georgia, Nevada and Texas. The FDIC and BB&T agreed to share losses on about $15 billion of those assets.
• In February 2019, Winston-Salem-based (North Carolina) BB&T agreed to acquire SunTrust Banks, Inc. for USD $28.24-billion in stock. Announced as a “merger of equals”, the former BB&T shareholders would control 57% of the new bank, with SunTrust holders owning the rest. The new bank would be known as Truist Financial (pronounced “True-ist”), the unusual choice of which was mocked by many after the announcement. Truist would become the No. 6 bank in the U.S. and move its headquarters to Charlotte, but Winston-Salem would become the bank's headquarters for community banking. At the time of the merger announcement, SunTrust had about 1,300 branches and BB&T about 1,800 branches. A major consolidation of the branch network was expected.

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United States Bank Mergers & Acquisitions (SunTrust Banks)

Photograph by Michael Gluzman. 

Photo: A blimp branded with SunTrust advertisement seen flying high above Atlanta. Special thanks to Michael Gluzman for granting me the permission to use his image.

SunTrust Banks was formed in 1985 when the Trust Co. of Georgia and Florida’s SunBanks merged – the former traces its origins to 1891 when the Commercial Travelers Savings Bank was founded in Atlanta by businessman Joel Hurt. Two years later, Mr. Hurt and another member of the board Ernest Woodruff spurred the re-organization of the bank into the Trust Co. of Georgia to better reflect its main business lines: trust and investment banking. This name would pretty much remain in use for the next 100 years. Though locally, the financial institution was often known simply as “the Trust Company”.

Mr. Woodruff would rise to the president of the Trust Company in 1904, and under his leadership the Trust Company brokered the consolidations of numerous companies and industries, establishing its position as a prominent player in the merchant banking and investment banking business in Atlanta.

Then in 1919, Mr. Woodruff made one of the shrewdest and most storied moves in corporate America’s history when he led a consortium to purchase The Coca-Cola Company from formula patent holder Asa G. Candler for USD $25-million. Later in that same year, the Trust Company underwrote the partial flotation of The Coca-Cola Co. In return, the Trust Company received USD $110,000 (in 1919 dollars) worth of Coca-Cola shares that it held for decades. That transaction cemented the close ties between the two Atlanta institutions for the decades to come. Until 2011, the only hand-written formula recipe of the carbonated brown syrup the world has known and tasted for over 100 years was stored in a secured vault in SunTrust Banks’ head office in Atlanta. In that year, the recipe was transferred to a vault in the World of Coca-Cola, which (the vault, not the recipe) is now on public display. The Trust Co. of Georgia (and later SunTrust) also held a stake in the Coca-Cola Co. until 2012.

The 1920s was an interesting decade for the predecessor banks that became SunTrust. Back in the early years of the Trust Company, a certain Colonel Robert James Lowry had been its president, but he left in 1895 to tend to his own bank Lowry Bank. In 1907, Lowry National Bank, by then having obtained a national charter, acquired the commercial banking operations of the Trust Company, rendering the latter once again as a pure trust company. In exchange, the Trust Company received 2,000 shares of Lowry National Bank. Then in 1923, the Trust Company combined with Lowry National and gave up the latter’s national charter, and the new entity adopted the name Lowry Bank & Trust Co. of Georgia and became a state-chartered bank again.

Just one year later, a complex three-way reorganization was carried out involving Lowry Bank & Trust and Georgia’s oldest nationally-chartered bank, Atlanta National Bank: the trust business of Lowry was once again spun off and resumed the old name the Trust Co. of Georgia, while Lowry merged with Atlanta National to become Atlanta & Lowry National Bank. Initially, the shareholders of Atlanta & Lowry National also fully controlled the Trust Co. of Georgia, so both financial institutions were still closely linked. This changed in 1933 when the federal Banking Act (part of which was the so-called Glass-Steagall Act) required deposit-taking banks be separated from securities dealers, and the Trust Co. of Georgia became fully independent from the First National Bank of Atlanta, the successor bank of Atlanta & Lowry National following another merger in 1929.

During the Great Depressions of the 1930s, the Trust Company gained majority ownership of five Georgian banks outside of Atlanta – in Augusta, Columbus, Macon, Rome and Savannah. Between the 1950s and 1970s, however, a change in policy ideology led to the passing of banking regulation that witnessed Georgia having one of the most stringent “statewide banking” restrictions in the U.S. Essentially, to protect small local banks, banks based in a city or county were no longer permitted to acquire banks outside of their home turfs – in other words – banks could not cross city or county borders. This severely "boxed" Georgia's banks into their home markets until 1970. In 1971, the name Trust Company Bank and TCG Bank were adopted and when statewide banking became legal, it promptly expanded into other markets in the state.

Outside of the home state, federal legislation known as the McFadden Act (1927) and Bank Holding Company Act (1956) gave each individual state the power to prohibit “inter-state banking”, so that banks in one state could not cross the state line and operate in another state, unless the home state of the acquired bank allowed such acquisitions. The inter-state banking ban only began to be relaxed in the late 1970s, beginning in state of Maine, and very slowly spreading to other states throughout the 1980s.

In some cases, the relaxation of inter-state banking began with regional reciprocal inter-state banking agreements. In 1985, Georgia and Florida passed reciprocal interstate banking agreements allowing the banks from either state to enter each other’s jurisdiction. The relaxation started a frenzy of cross-state-line consolidations across the Southeast as banks sought to expand into neighbouring markets as well as to build up their own scale to avoid being swallowed up. In July 1985, the Trust Co. of Georgia and Orlando-based SunBanks, Inc. merged and became the first inter-state banking merger under the reciprocal agreement in the Southeast. The new parent company took the name SunTrust Banks, Inc. but the two banks remained separate legal entities for years, as full operational integration across state lines was still illegal. The newly created SunTrust banks had USD $16.3-billion of assets. Soon after, other smaller acquisitions were made.

In 1986, SunTrust entered the Tennessee for the first time by acquiring the Third National Corp. of Nashville for USD $734-million. SunTrust added Third National’s 12 banks and 134 offices in the state to its 44 banks and 480 offices in Georgia and Florida. Also in 1986, SunTrust Securities was established to expand the bank’s product line.

Following years of operating under a decentralized manner and a mishmash of separate legal subsidiaries, SunBanks in Florida, Trust Co. of Georgia and Third National in Tennessee were unified as SunTrust beginning in 1995, when nationwide banking finally became legal in most states in America.

Recent transactions:

• In 1998, SunTrust made a major move northward when it spent USD $8.6-billion to acquire Richmond-based (Virginia) Crestar Financial Corp. The purchase made SunTrust the 10^th largest bank in the country. Crestar’s 396 branches in Virginia, Maryland and the District of Columbia would join SunTrust’s 697-office network in Florida, Georgia, Tennessee and Alabama.
• Also in 1998, SunTrust spent USD $150-million to acquire Tennessee’s Securities Co., a provider of equities underwriting services.
• In 2001, SunTrust purchased the Florida network of Huntington Bancshares Inc. for USD $705-million. Already a major player in the state, the purchase bolstered SunTrust to the No. 3 bank in Florida with 59 additional branches.
• Also in 2001, SunTrust made a bold move by launching a USD $14.7-billion hostile bid for North Carolina-based Wachovia Corp. SunTrust’s offer was about $1 billion higher than the one that Wachovia had accepted from First Union Corp. However, Wachovia’s shareholders eventually opted to merge with First Union instead of with SunTrust.
• Also in 2001, SunTrust acquired institutional capital markets business Robinson-Humphrey Company from Citigroup subsidiary Salomon Smith Barney to form SunTrust Robinson Humphrey.
• In 2004, SunTrust further cemented its position in the Southeast when it took over Memphis-based National Commerce Financial Corp. for USD $6.98-billion. National Commerce Financial operated primarily as the National Bank of Commerce and Central Carolina Bank with over 460 offices in Tennessee, North and South Carolina, Mississippi, Arkansas, Georgia, Virginia, West Virginia and Alabama. The purchase made SunTrust the No. 7 bank in the U.S. and the third largest in the Southeast with just over 1,690 branches and over 2,700 ATMs.
• In 2012, partly due to more stringent federal capital requirements, SunTrust sold its remaining 59 million of the 60 million shares of The Coca-Cola Co. that it first obtained in 1919 when its predecessor Trust Co. of Georgia underwrote the carbonated drink maker’s the initial public offering. The remaining 1 million shares were donated to the SunTrust Foundation.
• In 2019, Charlotte-based (North Carolina) BB&T Corp. agreed to acquire SunTrust Banks, Inc. for USD $28.24-billion in stock. Announced as a “merger of equals”, the former BB&T shareholders would control 57% of the new bank, with SunTrust holders owning the rest, with a combined market capitalization of about USD $66-billion. The new bank would be known as Truist Financial (pronounced “True-ist”), the unusual choice of which was mocked by many after the announcement. Truist would become the No. 6 bank in the U.S. and be based in Charlotte. SunTrust had about 1,300 branches and BB&T about 1,800 branches. As 740 branches of the two banks are within two miles of each other, many of them might be consolidated within a few years.

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USA Bank Mergers & Acquisitions (Truist Financial)

Truist Financial

Truist Financial Corp. was formed in December 2019 by the merger of BB&T Corp. of Winston-Salem (North Carolina) and SunTrust Banks, Inc. of Atlanta. The merger was announced back in February 2019 and at the time valued at USD $28.24-billion in stock. Announced as a “merger of equals”, the former BB&T shareholders would control 57% of the new bank, with SunTrust holders owning the rest. The unusual choice of the name was mocked by many after the announcement. Truist would become the No. 6 bank in the U.S. and move its headquarters to Charlotte, but Winston-Salem and Atlanta would both retain some "head office" functions for certain divisions of Truist.

At the time of the merger announcement, SunTrust had about 1,300 branches and BB&T about 1,800 branches. A major consolidation of the branch network was expected.

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United States Bank Mergers & Acquisitions (KeyCorp)

Photo: KeyBank Center is a multi-purpose, indoor sports arena in downtown Buffalo, New York. It's the home arena of the Buffalo Sabres NHL ice hockey team.

KeyBank is based in Cleveland, Ohio, but traces its main lineage to two regional banks: the original KeyBank from Albany, New York and Society National Bank from Cleveland.

The 19^th century was a time of rapid growth for states around the Great Lakes region. The opening of the 362-mile Erie Canal back in 1825 allowed people, grains, bulk goods, mail and natural resources to bypass the Appalachian Mountains, sharply reducing the time, costs and dangers involved in moving between the U.S. Eastern Seaboard and the Midwest. In other words, the Erie Canal opened up migration, communications, and the economy for a much vaster expanse of land.

It was under such an economic and social environment that KeyBank’s predecessors were established in the early- and mid-19^th century.

The KeyBank (KeyCorp) lineage

The New York branch of KeyBank’s lineage dates back to the 1825 establishment of the Commercial Bank of Albany (Albany is the capital of New York state).  

As mentioned elsewhere in this collection of bank histories, the banking industry in the United States had been one of fragmented regulation and instability during the 18^th and most of the 19^th centuries. During that time, no nationwide regulation even existed, as each state had its own laws governing that state’s banking system.  It was only in 1863 and 1864 that the U.S. Congress passed two National Banking Acts to formally establish a single national currency, and to create a nationwide banking regulatory framework to co-exist with the state regulations. As such, the National Banking Acts were not meant to seize banking regulation from the individual states to the federal government; rather, it aimed to provide a single superlative oversight system to monitor federally-chartered banks, as an additional layer of governance over state regulations. Banks back then, as they still do now, are free to choose to obtain either a state or a federal charter.

In 1865, following a conversion from a state charter to a national charter, the Commercial Bank of Albany adopted the name National Commercial Bank of Albany.

In 1919, the National Commercial Bank of Albany combined with the Union Trust Co. to become the National Commercial Bank and Trust Co.

Like all modern sizeable banks in the U.S., KeyBank grew out of many small local banks of humble origins. Another predecessor of KeyBank was the Trust and Deposit Co. of Onondaga in Syracuse in upstate New York, which was founded in 1869.  In 1919, the Trust and Deposit Co. of Onondaga amalgamated with its local rival First National Bank of Syracuse to become First Trust & Deposit.

In 1971, the National Commercial Bank and Trust Co. took over First Trust & Deposit and became First Commercial Bank. Throughout the 1970s, First Commercial expanded its presence by acquiring other banks in Western New York state. In 1979, First Commercial adopted a new and less ubiquitous name: “Key”.

From 1956 until the 1980s, the Bank Holding Company Act prohibited inter-state banking in the U.S., meaning that banks from one state were prohibited from acquiring or chartering a bank in another state, though in some states, inter-state bankinging was allowed but typically only for neighbouring states that had a regional reciprocal agreement such that, for example, banks based in Minnesota could establish branches in North Dakota, and vice versa.

In any case, when certain states began to relax inter-state banking restrictions in the 1980s, KeyBank bought a few banks in the Mountain States of Wyoming, Utah and Idaho, plus in Alaska. Taking advantage of Alaska’s inter-state banking agreement with other states, KeyBank used the Alaska subsidiary to acquire several small banks in Oregon. By now, it was clear that unlike other banks seeking to enter the “sexy” large urban centres such as Chicago or New York City, KeyBank was content to expand into the rural, less known backwater markets.

For many years, KeyBank had also wanted to expand into the New England region, but was forbidden from doing so due to regulations aimed at preventing New York-based banks from dominating in New England. The restriction was probably meant to bar the Manhattan powerhouses, but still applied to regional players such as KeyBank from Albany, New York.

By 1987, more and more of the inter-state banking bans were being lifted, and Rhode Island-based Fleet Financial merged with Albany’s Norstar Bancorp. To satisfy anti-trust requirements, Fleet/ Norstar agreed to sell eight Maine branches and their client accounts to KeyBank, marking Key’s first entry into the New England region.

KeyBank continued its cautious and steady approach to expansion in the 1990s, buying up banks in Idaho, Washington state, Colorado as well as in its home state of New York.  However, managing such a far-flung network of bank subsidiaries was an expensive business. Achieving synergy and sharing corporate functions was no simple matter when the branches were far from each other and were subject to various states’ regulations. Nevertheless, KeyBank undertook an efficiency drive to reduce costs and improve competitiveness by integrating systems and sharing cost centres wherever possible.

The Society National Bank (Society Corp.) lineage

The Ohio branch of KeyBank’s ancestry began with Cleveland-based Society National Bank, which commenced business in 1849 as the “Society for Savings”, a mutual savings bank (i.e. a co-op bank similar to a credit union).

As explained earlier, the mid-19^th century was generally a boom time for the U.S. Midwest following the opening of the Erie Canal system in the 1820s. The second half of the 19^th century witnessed a flood of settlers arriving from both the Eastern Seaboard and from overseas, who were chiefly German, Irish, Scandinavian and Jewish displaced by econo-political or ethnic turmoil in their homelands.

Society for Savings grew rapidly along with Cleveland during the 19^th century. In 1890, the savings bank moved into a new 10-story head office building on Public Square in downtown Cleveland, which was the tallest building in the city at the time. This Romanesque Revival building still stands prominently and is today a designated National Landmark.

Despite having just one single office, Society for Savings was so trusted that it was one of the four largest banks in Cleveland when it celebrated its centenary in 1949. It was only in 1953 that Society for Savings opened its first branch office in a Cleveland suburb.

However, as a mutual savings bank, Society for Savings was restricted to offering only personal banking, so in 1956 it created a separate subsidiary called Society National Bank to provide commercial banking and other lending and investing activities not allowed to mutual savings societies. Just two years later, the decision was made to re-organize the entire Society group: first, Society Corporation was created as a joint-stock parent company for Society National Bank, which then took over the assets, liabilities, reserves and operations of the mutually-owned Society for Savings. The conversion from a co-op bank to a public joint-stock business (a process known as “demutualization”) gave Society National much greater and easier access to raise new capital, and to escape from the many operation restrictions that co-op banks were subject to. Members of the former banking co-op received stock certificates of the new entity based on the amount of their deposits, hence becoming shareholders of the newly-formed joint-stock bank.

By the end of the 1970s, Society Corp. had used this new freedom to acquire over a dozen banks inside Ohio, such as the 1979 acquisition of Canton-based (Ohio) Harter BanCorp. This expansion continued throughout the 1980s, including the 1983 acquisition of Interstate Financial Corp. for USD $80-million. Interstate Financial was the parent company of the Third National Bank & Trust of Dayton, and had subsidiaries in Virginia, Maryland, Florida and Indiana.  The following year, Society acquired a credit- and bank-card processing company called BancSystems Association, which began as a joint-venture between Society Corp., National City Bank and Central National Bank in 1969.

Then later in 1984, Society Corp. took over Cleveland-based Central National Bank’s parent Centran Corp. for USD $220-million, making Society the fifth largest bank in Ohio. The banking holding company spent the next several years re-organizing the many acquisitions under nine regional districts, and shutting branches that were deemed overlapping.

Due to complex state and federal banking regulations at the time, the subsidiary banks under the Society Corp. umbrella were organized as separate legal entities and not as a single integral network. Towards the closing of the 1980s, bans on inter-state banking finally began to be relaxed, or dismantled altogether, which unleashed a wave of consolidations as smaller banks merged to form larger, more powerful banks, and stronger, larger banks bought smaller rivals to gain market share. In anticipation of this rapidly changing operating environment, Society Corp. sold BancSystems Association Inc. to Electronic Data Systems Corp. (EDS) in 1989 to strengthen its capital base.

In 1988, Society Corp. signed an agreement to be the anchor tenant of a new, 57-storey, 948-foot tall skyscraper in downtown Cleveland, which was completed in 1991.

In 1990, Society Corp. bought Toledo’s financially-troubled Trustcorp Inc. for USD $495-million, whose Trustcorp Bank subsidiary operated in northwest Ohio and neighbouring communities in Indiana and Michigan. Then in 1991, Society Corp. made its largest ever acquisition up to that time by taking over Cleveland’s Ameritrust Corp. for USD $1.2-billion. Ameritrust had bank and trust operations in Ohio, Michigan, Indiana, Connecticut, New York, Florida, Texas, Missouri and Colorado.

Recent transactions:

• In 1994, KeyCorp of Albany, New York and Society Corp. of Cleveland agreed to merge in a deal valued at USD $7.8-billion. The combination was seen as a merger of equals. Post-merger, the Society name was dropped, but KeyCorp relocated its headquarters from Albany into the 57-storey Society Center (now Key Tower) in downtown Cleveland.
• In 1998, KeyCorp bought Cleveland brokerage firm McDonald & Co. for USD $653-million. McDonald & Co. managed USD $5-billion of assets through 44 offices in 11 states. However, KeyCorp sold McDonald & Co.’s branch network to UBS in 2007 for USD $280-million, while retaining its former institutional businesses, including investment banking, debt and equity capital markets, public finance and research.
• In 2002, KeyCorp bought Union Bankshares Ltd. of Denver, Colorado, for USD $54-million. Its subsidiary Union Bank & Trust had seven branches in Denver.
• In 2004, KeyCorp bought EverTrust Financial of Everett, Washington for USD $195-million. Its subsidiary EverTrust Bank operated 12 branches in Washington state.
• In 2007, KeyCorp bought U.S.B. Holding of Nanuet, New York, for USD $575-million. Its subsidiary Union State Bank had 31 branches mainly in New York state’s Hudson Valley just north of New York City.
• In January 2012, KeyCorp agreed to buy 37 branches and their client accounts in the Buffalo region from First Niagara Bank for USD $110-million. First Niagara had in 2011 acquired 195 former HSBC branches and their client accounts in upstate New York, New York City and Connecticut for USD $1-billion from Britain’s HSBC Holdings.
• In 2015, KeyCorp acquired First Niagara Financial Group (based in Buffalo, New York) for USD $3.7-billion. First Niagara’s 300 branches in New York, Pennsylvania, Connecticut and Massachusetts joined Key’s over 900-branch network.
• In April 2016, KeyCorp agreed to sell 18 branches and their client accounts in the Buffalo area to Northwest Bank to satisfy the U.S. Department of Justice and Federal Reserve’s anti-trust concerns.
• In August 2024, KeyCorp agreed to raise USD $2.8-billion of capital by issuing 163-million of common shares to Canada's Bank of Nova Scotia (Scotiabank) at USD $17.17 per share. The capital raising would happen in two tranches, the final of which is expected to close by the first quarter of 2025. Following the sale, The Bank of Nova Scotia would have a pro forma 14.9% minority stake in KeyCorp, and have the right to appoint two individuals to serve on KeyCorp's Board of Directors.

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United States Bank Mergers & Acquisitions (Fifth Third Bancorp)

Photo: A Fifth Third Bank branch in Sandusky, Ohio.


Fifth Third Bancorp

The history of the U.S. banking system has been one of instability.  It is indeed ironic that the world’s most productive and innovative economy also has a banking system that has seen periodic booms and busts, and a regulatory environment that has swung from extreme liberalism to extreme regulation.  For much of the 18^th and 19^th centuries, no nationwide regulation even existed; each state had its own (however loose) laws governing the state’s banking system.  In the late 19^th century, well over 1,000 banks across the U.S. issued their own banknotes, each backed by various degree of capital reserves.  Due to this lack of regulation, many unscrupulous fraudsters would establish what was known as “wildcat banks,” quickly issuing as many banknotes as possible and using this money to purchase goods, other hard assets, or exchanging their own notes for other more reliable banknotes, then suddenly disappearing with the loots. As a matter of fact, during the first half of the 19^th century, half of all U.S. banks would fail periodically, to be replaced by other equally unreliable new banks.

This finally changed in 1863, when the Congress passed the National Banking Act, creating for the first time a national banking registration and regulatory framework.  This federal bank act created the distinction between nationally-chartered and regulated banks and banks authorized and chartered at the state level.  Under the 1863 Act, only national banks subject to a strict capital reserve requirement were permitted to issue banknotes.  This legal change not only prompted many former state banks to re-organize and apply for a national charter, but also the establishments of many new national banks.  However, many banks also opted to keep their state charters without switching to a national charter.  Further complicating things, national banks are still subject to many state bank regulations at the local level.

It should be noted that the term “national bank” in this context refers to a “bank with a national charter,” and does not suggest a bank with a nationwide branch network.  Quite the contrary, the United States for a very long time heavily regulated where their banks could or could not operate.  Many states allowed their state banks to offer service from just the head office (i.e. “branching” was forbidden) whereas some states permitted branch banking. Meanwhile, the nationally-chartered banks were not allowed to offer branch banking at all.

In order to be fair to both state banks and national banks, the U.S. Congress in 1927 passed the McFadden Act, which basically accorded the same “branching rights” to national banks as to state banks.  As state-chartered banks were not permitted to operate outside of their home states, the McFadden Act forbade national banks based in one state from branching out into another state.  This restriction is why the 1927 McFadden Act is known as the law that banned “inter-state banking.”

It is under such a complex environment that in 1863, the Third National Bank of Cincinnati was founded, the name was adopted because there existed already the First National Bank of Cincinnati and the Second National Bank of Cincinnati.  In 1871, the Third National Bank acquired the Bank of the Ohio Valley (founded 1858) and became the largest bank in the state of Ohio.

Meanwhile, in 1888, the Queen City National Bank, founded six years earlier, underwent a re-organization and somehow condescended to the new name of The Fifth National Bank of Cincinnati.

In 1907, a widespread credit and confidence crisis in the U.S. led to nationwide bank runs; the weakened Fifth National Bank of Cincinnati in 1908 agreed to combine with the Third National Bank of Cincinnati to form the Fifth Third National Bank of Cincinnati.  Then in 1919, Fifth Third National became affiliated with an Ohio state-chartered financial firm called the Union Savings Bank & Trust Company, which was renamed the Union Trust Company in 1923. Fifth Third National’s affiliation with the state-chartered firm gave it the ability to circumvent (as a national bank) the restriction against having branches, and the bank acquired a number of smaller banks around the city of Cincinnati during the 1920s.

In 1927, Fifth Third National and Union Trust finally fully consolidated, and adopted the name Fifth Third Union Trust Company.  As one of the stronger banks in Ohio, the bank took over three insolvent banks between 1930 and 1933, in the midst of the Great Depression.

The rest of the 1930s and 1940s saw few significant changes for Fifth Third Union Trust. During the 1950s and 1960s, the bank consolidated a number of small banks within the state of Ohio.  The rapid growth in consumerism saw the gradual shift from commercial banking to personal banking for the bank.  In 1969, Fifth Third Union Trust adopted a simplified name: Fifth Third Bank. Five years later, a holding company called the Fifth Third Bancorp was created.  Still, despite a history of consolidations over a century, Fifth Third as recent as in 1976 only had 37 branches around the Cincinnati county.

State and federal restrictions on branch banking finally relaxed in the 1980s, first allowing Ohio banks to open branches outside of their home counties, then certain states within the same region began to permit each other’s banks to cross state borders.  In 1985, Fifth Third Bank acquired the American National Bank of Newport, just across the Ohio-Kentucky state line.  Even though Newport is part of the Metropolitan Cincinnati area, as it is in the state of Kentucky, Fifth Third was now allowed to operate there until the legislation change of 1985. Suddenly liberated from the branching restrictions, Fifth Third quickly acquired more banks in northern Ohio, Kentucky and Indiana (the state to the west of Ohio).

The decade from 1985 to 1996, however, was otherwise very turbulent times in the American banking system.  A sudden sharp rise in interest rates due to soaring inflation caught the savings and loans (S&Ls, as banking co-operatives are known in the U.S.) off-guard, as their business model relied on using personal deposits as the source of capital, then lending it as mortgage loans to borrowers. As personal deposits are often short-term and open in nature, but the mortgage loans are of longer and fixed-terms, as interest rates spiralled in the early 1980s, the S&Ls found their cost of capital (interest rates paid to personal deposits) rising high above the rate of returns (mortgage loan rates that were fixed before the sudden interest rate jumps).  Before long, the S&Ls were suffering from severe losses from the asset-liability mis-match. At the same time, the credit crisis led to a sharp drop in real estate prices and the overall economy, and mortgage defaults skyrocketed.  As capital was depleted, many S&Ls became insolvent.  The situation became so dire that even the government-run deposit insurance schemes at quite a few states went bankrupt.

Fifth Third, being a more cautiously-run bank, took advantage of the crisis and absorbed many smaller rivals in financial trouble throughout the late 1980s and early 1990s, and slowly but surely expanded its branch network and market share.  Then in 1992, Fifth Third held private talks to merge with Ohio rival Star Banc Corp., which traces its history to the First National Bank of Cincinnati.  However, the discussion failed to result in a deal.  (Star Banc Corp. eventually became U.S. Bancorp.)

In 1994, Fifth Third made two acquisitions.  First, it bought the Cumberland Federal Bancorporation for USD $149-million, gaining 43 branches across Kentucky.  Later in the same year, it bought Falls Financial for USD $76-million.  Falls Financial was a small bank based in northeastern Ohio.  Then in 1995, Fifth Third bought a small bank in Florida called the Bank of Naples, which had three branches.

Throughout the rest of the 1990s, the bank made numerous bank acquisitions in its core market of Ohio, Kentucky and Indiana, each time gaining no more than a dozen branches or so.  Fifth Third, as such, was still a regional bank with meaningful operations only in three conjoining Midwest states at this time.

Recent transaction(s):

• In 1998, Fifth Third (branded as “5/3”) bought another Ohio rival CitFed Bancorp of Dayton for USD $727-million, whose subsidiary Citizens Federal Bank had 36 branches.
• Also in 1998, 5/3 purchased State Savings Co. for USD $918-million. The deal added 43 branches in the Columbus (Ohio) area and ten in Arizona to 5/3’s network, though the small Arizona network was disposed of later. By now Fifth Third had over 450 branches across Ohio, Kentucky, Indiana and Florida.
• Also in 1998, 5/3 bough two other financial services firms, namely the Ohio Company, a full-service broker-dealer and investment manager; and W. Lyman Case & Co., a commercial mortgage financier.
• In 1998 and 1999, 5/3 acquired several smaller banks in Ohio, Kentucky and Florida.
• In 1999, 5/3 made its biggest acquisition to date when it bought CNB Bancshares of Indiana for USD $2.3-billion. CNB’s subsidiary Civitas Bank had 145 branches and 200 ATMs mostly in Indiana, but also a small presence in Kentucky, Illinois and Michigan.
• Also in 1999, 5/3 bought Peoples Bank Corp. of Indianapolis for USD $228-million. Peoples Bank & Trust had nine branches.
• In 2000, 5/3 bought Ottawa Financial Corp. for USD $168-million.  Ottawa Financial had 27 branches in Michigan.
• Also in 2000, 5/3 bought Capital Holdings of Ohio for USD $244-million.
• In 2001, 5/3 acquired Old Kent Financial Corp. for USD $4.92-billion.  Old Kent had 340 branches in Michigan, Illinois and Indiana. The deal made Fifth Third one of the top five banks in Michigan and the Chicago area.
• In 2004, 5/3 bought First National Bancshares of Florida, Inc., for USD $1.58-billion. First National Bank of Florida operated 77 branches mainly in Southwest and Central Florida.
• In 2007, 5/3 agreed to purchase R-G Crown Bank from Puerto Rico's R & G Financial Corp. for USD $288-million. R-G Crown Bank operated 30 branches in Florida and 3 in Georgia.
• In 2007, 5/3 bought First Charter Corp. of Charlotte, North Carolina, for USD $1.09-billion. First Charter Bank operated 61 branches in North Carolina and another 2 in Georgia.
• By 2014, 5/3 operates over 1,300 branches across 12 contiguous Midwest states of Ohio, Kentucky, Indiana, Illinois, Michigan, Missouri, Georgia, North Carolina, Pennsylvania, West Virginia, Tennessee and Florida.
• In May 2018, 5/3 agreed to acquire Chicago-based MB Financial for USD $4.7-billion. MB Financial Bank's 91 branches will join Fifth Third's existing 148 branches in the city, though as many as 50 branches will be shut following the consolidation. The purchase will expand Fifth Third's deposit base in the Chicago area from $11-billion to $25-billion, making it one of the top four banks in the market.
• In October 2025, 5/3 announced that it would acquire Dallas-based Comerica Inc. and Comerica Bank for USD $10.9-billion. Comerica had over 400 branches in Arizona, California, Florida, Michigan and Texas; as well as wholesale banking operations in Canada and Mexico. Comerica's principal market was in middle-market business lending, and would complement 5/3's strength in retail and digital banking. The enlarged bank would have assets of USD $288-billion, making it the 9th-largest bank in United States.

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United States Bank Mergers & Acquisitions (International Banking Corp. and European American Bank)

Photo: The International Banking Corp. (IBC) was the first American bank with an extensive international branch nextwork. Founded in 1901 in Connecticut, IBC became a major foreign bank in China, and issued part of China's banknotes until 1927.  IBC became part of the National City Bank of New York (today's Citigroup) in 1915.

Photo: European American Bank started out as Belgian bank Banque Belge pour l'Etranger's New York branch.  This is an old cheque from the bank from 1927.


Two of the banks that became part of Citigroup are of special interest to me.  One is the International Banking Corporation (IBC), founded in 1902 in Connecticut as the first American bank permitted, and with the specific mandate, to operate foreign branches.  IBC was acquired by Citigroup (then the National City Bank of New York) in 1915.

The other bank of interest is the European-American Bank (EAB), which started out as the New York branch of a Belgian bank.  It would become a sizeable retail bank in the state of New York in the 1970s.  Citigroup bought EAB in 2001.

International Banking Corporation (IBC)

Before 1914, banks chartered in the New York state or chartered federally were forbidden to have branches outside of the United States.  To provide international money transfer services, New York banks such as National City Bank could only do so by developing correspondent payment clearing agreements with foreign banks.  In this regard, American banks were very backward when compared with their British, French, German and Belgian counterparts, which had by the late 19^th century opened offices outside of their home markets, though mainly in their overseas colonies or territories.

Interestingly, American trust companies, which were not legally-defined as banks but nevertheless operated like full-service banks except in names, were free to open foreign branches.   Also, as each state has its own banking regulations, certain states did permit their state-chartered banks to operate outside of the United States.  In particular, Connecticut was one such state and in 1901, the International Banking Corporation (IBC) was established in that state with the specific mandate to engage in overseas banking.

Almost immediately, the International Banking Corporation opened its first overseas branches in a market with a very under-developed banking sector and a weak central government that relied on foreign banks: China.  By 1902, IBC had opened branches in Britain, China, Hong Kong, India, Japan, Philippines and Singapore; and domestically in San Francisco – America’s gateway to the Orient.  From at least as early as 1905 until 1927, IBC, like a large number of local Chinese, foreign and Sino-foreign joint-venture banks, issued China’s banknotes.

Asia, however, was not IBC’s sole focus, for it opened an office in Mexico in 1903; Panama and the Straits Settlement of Penang (part of today’s Malaysia) in 1904 and Canton (now Guangzhou) in 1906.

Banking regulations in the U.S. were changed in 1914, finally allowing American banks to manage direct branches overseas.  Very quickly, IBC probably lost its niche and status as the only meaningful American overseas bank.  In 1915, National City Bank of New York (now Citigroup) acquired control of IBC.  For at least another decade, IBC under National City’s control continued to expand under its own right, opening an office in Colombia in 1916; Dominican Republic in 1917; Java (Indonesia) in 1918, and Burma and France in 1919.  In 1921, National City transferred its Madrid and Barcelona branches to IBC.  Eventually, IBC was integrated into Citibank (then National City Bank of New York).

European American Bank (EAB)

European American Bank (EAB), for several decades one of the top 10 bank in New York state and a market leader in Long Island, had an interesting history.  EAB dates back to the 1921 establishment of Banque Belge pour l'Etranger’s New York branch, which itself was founded in 1902 by Belgium's Société Générale de Banque (which eventually became part of Fortis S.A./NV).  The bank dropped its French name in favour of the name Belgian-American Banking Corp. in 1950 and obtained a state charter in New York.

In the 1960's, several European banks longed to expand into the U.S. market, but found themselves too small to introduce meaningful and profitable operations in the huge U.S. market. In 1968, Société Générale de Banque (Belgium), AMRO Bank (Netherlands), Deutsche Bank (Germany) and Midland Bank (Great Britain) became joint shareholders of Belgian-American Banking Corp. and renamed it European-American Bank & Trust. In 1971, two more European banks Creditanstalt-Bankverein from Austria, and France's Société Générale also became shareholders of the New York bank.

In 1974, Euopean-American Bank & Trust bought part of the bankrupt Franklin National Bank, a rural bank in the New York state. By the late 1970s, the bank became one of New York's 10 largest retail banks and was the market leader in the Long Island region.   In 1984, the bank’s name was shortened to European American Bank (EAB).  As can be expected, the European banking consortium that collectively owned EAB eventually began to disagree on the future of their American subsidiary so that by 1991, ABN AMRO Holding NV became EAB’s sole owner. Subsequently, even ABN AMRO decided to exit the New York retail banking market when it sold EAB (with 97 branches mostly in Long Island) to Citigroup in 2001 for USD $1.6-billion.

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United States Bank Mergers & Acquisitions (U.S. Bancorp)

Photo: A U.S. Bank branch on 1st Avenue in downtown Seattle.


U.S. Bancorp


First Bank System Inc.

In April 1929, dozens of small banks located in the Ninth Federal Reserve District (the states of Minnesota, Montana, the Dakotas, northwestern Wisconsin and the Upper Peninsula of Michigan) formed a loose confederation called First Bank Stock Investment Corp. The purpose of the confederation was to provide mutual financial support during difficult economic times, as the Federal Deposit Insurance Corp. (FDIC) had not been created at the time. Of those that came into the First Bank federation, the two leading ones were the First National Bank of Minneapolis and the First National Bank of St. Paul, both of which were founded in 1864.

The timing of the banking confederation’s creation was fortunate, as barely six months later, the Great Stock Market Crash hit Wall Street and led to the decade-long Great Depression. In 1933, amidst a widespread panic, U.S. president Franklin Roosevelt passed an emergency act to shut down all American banks to prevent a nationwide bank run, which could easily have ruined the entire banking system. Financial inspections were carried out on all U.S. banks during the 10-day closure, and only the financially viable banks were permitted to re-open. As a testimony to their conservative management, all of First Bank Stock Investment’s subsidiary banks were found to be financially sound.

However, despite their common ownership, the First Bank banks operated independently and each bank had its own management. In the Twin Cities of Minneapolis and St. Paul, member banks actually fought fiercely and counter-productively with each other for business.

In 1954, the passing of the new Bank Holding Company Act prohibited a bank holding company headquartered in one state from acquiring out-of-state banks. However, existing multi-state banks such as First Bank were exempted from the new restriction. First Bank at the time already had operations in Montana, South Dakota, North Dakota and Minnesota.

In 1968, First Bank Stock Investment Corp. adopted the new name First Bank System. Throughout much of the latter half of the 20th century, the group’s member banks continued to fight for business individually without coordinating with each other, collectively offering hundreds of different saving and loan products, each with its own interest rate terms and features. The group’s disorganization also led to dozens of antiquated data processing systems.

Meaningful restructuring finally was carried out in the early 1990s, when major upgrades and streamlining of the computer systems and product lineup were carried out to improved efficiency, as well as to finally integrate all member banks into one network.


Firstar Corp.

Firstar traces its history to 1853 when the Farmers and Millers Bank was established in Milwaukee, Wisconsin. In 1863, the bank obtained a national charter and changed its name to First National Bank of Milwaukee. In 1919, First National merged with Wisconsin National Bank to become First Wisconsin National Bank of Milwaukee. During the Great Depression, both First Wisconsin and its holding company Wisconsin Bankshares Corp. experienced severe financial difficulties but survived following a series of reorganizations. In 1960, the bank holding company was renamed First Wisconsin Bancshares Corp.

First Wisconsin’s first expansion outside of the state only became possible when legislation changes allowing inter-state banking within regional zones were passed in 1987. The new law permitted banks within the eight Midwestern states of Wisconsin, Illinois, Minnesota, Ohio, Michigan, Iowa, Indiana, Missouri and Kentucky to acquire or be acquired each other. First Wisconsin then promptly bought a bank in Illinois, followed by other purchases in Iowa and Minnesota. In 1989, to remove the impression that it is a Wisconsin-only bank, First Wisconsin renamed itself Firstar Corp.


U.S. Bancorp

In 1891, a group of businessmen in Oregon organized the United States National Bank of Portland. U.S. National, as the bank became commonly known, acquired rival Oregon bank Ainsworth National in 1902, then another venerable Portland bank Ladd and Tilton in 1925. 

Still, by 1965, U.S. National remained a single-state bank with all 100 branches in Oregon. In 1968, reflecting new banking legislation, a holding company called U.S. Bancorp was created. U.S. Bancorp’s expansion outside of Oregon began in the 1980s when it acquired banks in Wisconsin, Utah, Colorado and Washington. In the 1990s, California became a new market for U.S. Bank when several small banks were purchased.

Recent transaction(s):

• In 1993, First Bank System purchased Colorado National Bancshares Inc.
• In 1994, First Bank System bought Metropolitan Financial Corp. of North Dakota for USD $863-million. Metropolitan was a multi-state bank holding company with 211 offices across the Midwest. Following the purchase, First Bank sold 60 of Metropolitan’s branches that didn’t fit the expansion plan.
• In May 1995, U.S. Bank acquired West One Bancorp of Idaho for USD $1.6-billion.
• In 1995, First Bank System acquired FirsTier Financial Inc. of Omaha, Nebraska for USD $700-million. Firstier had 63 offices in Nebraska and Iowa. It was First Bank’s 3rd purchase in Nebraska in the year; earlier in 1995, it had bought Southwest Bank and First Bank of Omaha.
• In 1996, First Bank System offered to buy Los Angeles-based First Interstate Bancorporation for USD $10-billion. But First Interstate later accepted a USD $12.3-billion offer from Wells Fargo & Co. As part of the agreement, Wells Fargo paid a USD $200-million break fee to First Bank System.
• In 1997, First Bank System of Minneapolis purchased U.S. Bancorp Inc. of Portland, Oregon, for USD $8.4-billion. First Bank System adopted the U.S. Bank name. First Bank was said to have been anxious to shed its First Bank name as the U.S. is awash with hundreds of banks with similar “First” names.
• In 1998, the new U.S. Bancorp bought investment bank Piper Jaffray Cos. Inc. for USD $730-million. But in 2003, Piper Jaffray was spun off, becoming an independent, listed company again.
• In 1998, Star Banc Corp. of Cincinnati bought Firstar Corp. of Milwaukee for USD $7.2-billion. The name Firstar was retained. Star Banc was a successor bank of the First National Bank of Cincinnati (founded in 1863). Interestingly, it’s this First National Bank of Cincinnati’s banking charter that was retained by the future U.S. Bank, and these days U.S. Bank considers its founding year to be 1863.
• In 1999, the new Firstar Corp. acquired Mercantile Bancorporation of St. Louis, Missouri, for USD $9.9-billion. Mercantile Bank had USD $36-billion in assets and operated 500 branches in Missouri, Iowa, Kansas, Illinois, Arkansas and Kentucky.
• In 2000, Firstar Corp. of Wisconsin bought U.S. Bancorp for USD $21.2-billion but decided to retain the U.S. Bancorp/ U.S. Bank names. Before the merger, First Star had 1,200 branches in 13 states and U.S. Bancorp had 1,000 branches in 16 states.
• In March 2008, U.S. Bank acquired Mellon 1st Business Bank from the Bank of New York Mellon for an undisclosed amount. Mellon 1st Business Bank had 7 branches in California with USD $2.9-billion in assets and USD $2.7-billion in deposits.
• During the Credit Crisis of 2008, U.S. Bancorp received USD $6.6-billion of TARP fund from the Federal Reserve, which was fully repaid during the summer of 2009.
• In September 2009, U.S. Bank acquired Citibank’s Diners Club Card merchant-location portfolio in Western Europe representing 75,000 merchants. U.S. Bank also gained Diners Club card’s processing and customer support business for merchants in the UK, Ireland, France, Benelux, Switzerland and Germany through a separate agreement with Discover’s Diners Club International Ltd.
• In October 2009, U.S. Bank acquired USD $850-million in deposits and 14 branches of BB&T Bank’s Nevada operations.
• In October 2009, U.S. bank acquired nine different banks that were part of the FBOP Corp. of Illinois from an FDIC-brokered transaction. U.S. Bank gained USD $18.0-billion in assets, USD $15.4-billion in deposits, and 150 branches in California, Illinois, Arizona and Texas. The nine banks acquired included: BankUSA, California National Bank, Citizens National Bank, Madisonville State Bank, North Houston Bank, Pacific National Bank, Park National Bank, San Diego National Bank and Community Bank of Lemont.
• In January 2011, U.S. Bank acquired the banking operations of First Community Bank, a subsidiary of New Mexico’s First State Bancorporation from the FDIC. The purchase included USD $2.1-billion of assets, USD $1.8-billion of deposits and 38 branches in New Mexico and Arizona.
• In January 2012, U.S. Bank acquired the operations of BankEast Corp. of Tennessee through an FDIC-brokered deal. U.S. Bank gained USD $272-million of assets, USD $268-million of deposits and ten branches.
• In March 2013, U.S. Bank acquired the municipal bond trustee business of Deutsche Bank. Terms of the deal were not disclosed, but U.S. Bank would add USD $57-billion of assets to the USD $3-trillion already under administration in the corporate trust division.
• In September 2021, U.S. Bank announced that it would acquire MUFG Union Bank from Japan's Mitsubishi UFJ Financial Group for USD $8.0 billion, consisting of USD $5.5-billion in cash and 44-million shares of U.S. Bancorp common shares worth about USD $2.5-billion. After the transaction, Mitsubishi UFJ Financial Group would hold a 2.9% minority stake in U.S. Bancorp. U.S. Bank would gain MUFG Union Bank's more than 1 million loyal consumer customers and about 190,000 small business customers on the West Coast in addition to approximately $58 billion in loans and $90 billion in deposits. MUFG Union had 305 branches -- a vast majority in California, but also in Washington and Oregon states. The bank also operated commercial banking offices in in Texas, Illinois, New York, and Georgia.

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