NORTH LIBERTY, Iowa—The $8-billion GreenState Credit Union here has agreed to purchase $411-million Midwest Community Bank, based in Freeport, Ill., and its subsidiary, Blueleaf Lending, LLC.
The move marks the third purchase of a bank by the credit union in the last five months, and all have been outside of the CU’s home state of Iowa. Terms of the most recent deal were not announced.
As CUToday.info reported, GreenState in May simultaneously agreed to buy two separate banks in two states outside of Iowa. GreenState agreed to purchase the $345-million Premier Bank in GreenState said it will purchase substantially all of the assets and assume substantially all of the liabilities of MCB and Blueleaf, including all of the bank’s full-service banking locations as well as its loan production offices in and around the Chicago area. The transaction is subject to customary closing conditions, including the receipt of required regulatory approvals, and is expected to close in the second quarter of 2022, the CU stated.
MCB was established in 1965 and currently serves over 20,000 customers. The bank has been profitable, reporting net income of $6.2 million in 2019, $20.9 million in 2020 and $7.1 through June of 2021, according to FDIC data.
History of Service
“Our bank has a long history of providing exceptional customer service and giving back to our communities,” stated Mark and Todd Wright, co-CEOs of MCB, in a joint statement. “When we set out to find a potential partner, we wanted one that matched up well with our core value of nurturing long-term customer relationships. We found that alignment with GreenState Credit Union. Together we will be able to do great things for our staff, our customers, and the communities we serve. We couldn’t be more excited about the future.”
Added GreenState President and CEO Jeff Disterhoft, “The combined resources of GreenState and Midwest Community Bank will produce excellent opportunities for their customers and the communities they live in. It means improvements in product pricing, expansion of branch locations, and additional digital convenience services that will improve the financial lives of their customers.”
The 340,000-member GreenState noted that for the last 10 years it has been ranked in the top 1% of all U.S. financial institutions for returning profits to its members in the form of better rates and fewer fees, according to Callahan and Associates data. GreenState has 24 branch locations across Iowa, Illinois, Wisconsin, Nebraska and South Dakota.
When GreenState agreed to buy Premier Bank and Oxford Bank & Trust earlier this year, the combined assets of those banks made the deal the second-largest CU/bank purchase to date, with the largest being Jacksonville, Fla.-based VyStar CU’s April announcement it is acquiring the $1.5-billion Heritage Southeast Bank in Jonesboro, Ga.
‘King of the Mountain’
Michael Bell, the pioneer of CU purchases of banks and a partner and co-chair of the Financial Institutions Practice Group at Honigman, LLP, which is representing GreenState, said this latest move by GreenState illustrates how the credit union has become the leader in CU purchases of banks.
“There is no better way to say this: GreenState is simply the king of the mountain when it comes to credit union bank buys,” said Bell, who has been involved in more than 40 whole-bank agreements, plus additional bank branch purchases. “They are the leader, they are executing a deliberate and well-thought-out strategy and becoming a better CU for their members, employees and communities.”