In a move that will create the third largest banking institution headquartered in Colorado, Kansas-based Sunflower Financial and Texas-based Strategic Growth Bancorp announced plans to merge.
Sunflower Financial and Strategic Growth Bancorp are both holding companies.
Strategic Growth Bancorp is the parent company of First National Bank of Santa Fe, Capital Bank and Guardian Mortgage Company.
First National Bank of Santa Fe is a nationally chartered banking organization headquartered in Santa Fe, New Mexico and operates as First National Santa Fe and First National Rio Grande in New Mexico, and First National Denver in Colorado.
Capital Bank is a state chartered bank headquartered in El Paso, Texas. Guardian Mortgage is headquartered in Dallas, Texas.
Combined, the subsidiaries of Strategic Growth Bancorp have $2.2 billion in total assets, $1.7 billion in deposits and $283 million of equity capital as of June 30.
Sunflower Financial’s subsidiaries are Sunflower Bank and Logia Portfolio Management. The two companies have $1.8 billion in total assets, $1.4 billion in deposits and $197 million of equity capital as of June 30.
According to the terms of the merger, the holding companies will be merged and the subsidiaries will be merged as well.
In a release, the companies said the merger will a “super-community bank” with more than 60 offices in Colorado, Kansas, Missouri, New Mexico, and Texas.
“The transaction partners two relationship-focused community bank organizations with stable deposit platforms and synergistic lending and fee income strategies,” the companies said in a joint release.
Per information provided by the company, the combined company will have approximately $4 billion in banking assets with approximately $3 billion in both net loans and deposits.
The company stated that it will establish new corporate headquarters in Denver, and will keep “substantial office functions” in Salina, Kansas, and New Mexico and Texas.
In the release, the companies said that the combined holding company will be the third largest Colorado headquartered banking institution in terms of total assets.
Mollie Hale Carter, current chairman and CEO of Sunflower, will serve as CEO and president of the combined holding company and CEO of the bank.
Hale Carter will serve as co-chairman of the combined holding company and chairman of the bank.
William Sanders, current chairman of Strategic Growth Bancorp, will serve as co-chairman of the holding company, while Pablo Sanders, current chairman of First National Bank of Santa Fe and Capital Bank, will be the chief operating officer of the holding company with responsibility for the mortgage and wealth management businesses, and interim president of the bank.
“We believe we are merging two very special organizations that will have the capital and earnings power to continue to grow and successfully provide our clients with a unique community banking experience,” Hale Carter said. “We have each invested heavily in our franchises and fee businesses that will benefit from this increased scale.”
Financial terms of the merger were not disclosed. Both the Strategic Growth Bancorp and Sunflower Financial boards of directors unanimously approved the merger.
The merger is expected to close in the first quarter of 2017, the companies said.
“We are excited to be in a position to combine these two banking enterprises each with a heritage of century-old community ties,” Pablo Sanders said. “We will bring the strength of a larger organization while maintaining locally informed decision making.”
