Sunday, November 8, 2009

More Small Town Banks Bought Out by The Big Ones

More Big Banks Sucking Up / Absorbing the Small

November 6, 2009

AMCORE Bank's Monroe and Argyle Branches Sold to First National Bank and Trust

GlobeNewswire

ROCKFORD, Ill., Nov 6, 2009 (GlobeNewswire via COMTEX) - AMCORE Bank, N.A., a wholly-owned subsidiary of AMCORE Financial, Inc. (AMFI), today announced that it has completed the sale of its branches in the Wisconsin communities of Monroe and Argyle to First National Bank and Trust Company of Beloit, WI. The sale included approximately $70 million in loans, $135 million in deposits and sweep accounts, and up to $45 million in related trust accounts. The 401(k) plan business was not part of the sale and remains with AMCORE. The financial terms of the transaction were not disclosed.

In making the announcement, AMCORE Chairman and Chief Executive Officer William McManaman said: "The sale of these branches is another step in AMCORE's strategic efforts to raise capital as we continue to focus on serving our core markets. We are pleased that First National Bank and Trust Company has a strong community banking philosophy and we believe it will continue to serve customers with the high quality service that AMCORE proudly provided."

Steven M. Eldred, President and Chief Executive Officer of First National Bank and Trust, expressed his optimism for the potential new opportunities made possible by the acquisition. "For more than 127 years we've provided great service and sound financial advice to the Stateline. Our goal is simple; to help our customers succeed financially. In doing this we build a brighter future for our employees, customers and the communities we serve. We are proud to bring our brand of community banking to Monroe and Argyle."

ABOUT First National

First National Bank and Trust Company, headquartered in Beloit, WI, operates 11 banking locations in Southern Wisconsin and Northern Illinois. The bank has total assets of $631 million and offers full service banking to its customers, including consumer mortgage services, trust, brokerage and retirement services. Additional information about First National Bank and Trust Company is available on the company's website at www.bankatfirstnational.com.

ABOUT AMCORE

AMCORE Financial, Inc. is headquartered in Northern Illinois and has banking assets of $4.4 billion with 69 locations in Illinois and Wisconsin, (excluding Argyle and Monroe). AMCORE provides a full range of consumer and commercial banking services, a variety of mortgage lending products and wealth management services including trust, brokerage, private banking, financial planning, investment management, insurance and comprehensive retirement plan services.

AMCORE common stock is listed on The NASDAQ Stock Market under the symbol "AMFI." Further information about AMCORE Financial, Inc. can be found at the Company's website at www.AMCORE.com.

FORWARD LOOKING STATEMENTS

This news release contains, and our periodic filings with the Securities and Exchange Commission and written or oral statements made by the Company's officers and directors to the press, potential investors, securities analysts and others will contain, forward-looking statements within the meaning of Section 27A of the Securities Act of 1933 and Section 21E of the Securities Act of 1934, and the Company intends that such forward-looking statements be subject to the safe harbors created thereby with respect to, among other things, the financial condition, results of operations, plans, objectives, future performance and business of AMCORE. Statements that are not historical facts, including statements about beliefs and expectations, are forward-looking statements. These statements are based upon beliefs and assumptions of AMCORE's management and on information currently available to such management. The use of the words "believe", "expect", "anticipate", "plan", "estimate", "should", "may", "will" or similar expressions identify forward-looking statements. Forward-looking statements speak only as of the date they are made, and AMCORE undertakes no obligation to update publicly any forward-looking statements in light of new information or future events.

Contemplated, projected, forecasted or estimated results in such forward-looking statements involve certain inherent risks and uncertainties. A number of factors - many of which are beyond the ability of the Company to control or predict - could cause actual results to differ materially from those in its forward-looking statements. These factors include, among others, the following possibilities: (I) heightened competition, including specifically the intensification of price competition, the entry of new competitors and the formation of new products by new or existing competitors; (II) adverse state, local and federal legislation and regulation or adverse findings or rulings made by local, state or federal regulators or agencies regarding AMCORE and its operations; (III) failure to obtain new customers and retain existing customers and related deposit relationships; (IV) inability to carry out marketing and/or expansion plans; (V) ability to attract and retain key executives or personnel; (VI) changes in interest rates including the effect of prepayments; (VII) general economic and business conditions which are less favorable than expected; (VIII) equity and fixed income market fluctuations; (IX) unanticipated changes in industry trends; (X) unanticipated changes in credit quality and risk factors; (XI) success in gaining regulatory approvals when required; (XII) changes in Federal Reserve Board monetary policies; (XIII) unexpected outcomes on existing or new litigation in which AMCORE, its subsidiaries, officers, directors or employees are named defendants; (XIV) technological changes; (XV) changes in accounting principles generally accepted in the United States of America; (XVI) changes in assumptions or conditions affecting the application of "critical accounting estimates"; (XVII) inability of third-party vendors to perform critical services for the Company or its customers; (XVIII) disruption of operations caused by the conversion and installation of data processing systems; (XIX) adverse economic or business conditions affecting specific loan portfolio types in which the Company has a concentration, such as construction and land development loans; (XX) zoning restrictions or other limitations at the local level, which could prevent limited branch offices from transitioning to full-service facilities; (XXI) possible changes in the creditworthiness of customers and value of collateral and the possible impairment of collectibility of loans; (XXII) changes in lending terms to the Company and the Bank by the Federal Reserve, Federal Home Loan Bank, or any other regulatory agency or third party; (XXIII) the recently enacted Emergency Economic Stabilization Act of 2008, and the various programs the U.S. Treasury and the banking regulators are implementing to address capital and liquidity issues in the banking system, all of which may have significant effects on the Company and the financial services industry, the exact nature and extent of which cannot be determined at this time; and (XXIV) failure by the company to comply with the provisions of any regulatory order or agreement to which the Company is subject could result in additional and material enforcement actions by the applicable regulatory agencies.

This news release was distributed by GlobeNewswire, www.globenewswire.com

SOURCE: AMCORE Financial, Inc.


CONTACT: AMCORE Financial, Inc.
Media Inquiries:
Katherine Taylor
815-961-7164
First National Bank and Trust
Media Inquiries:
Laura Pomerene
608-363-8048



http://license.icopyright.net/user/viewContent.act?clipid=395839215&mode=cnc&tag=3.8218%3Ficx_id%3DNewsfeed103811471

Saturday, November 7, 2009

Vaccines for the rich! Wall Street gets H1N1 vaccine bailout while school children told to wait

Friday, November 06, 2009 by: Mike Adams, the Health Ranger, NaturalNews Editor

(NaturalNews) It seems the financial bailout isn't the only bailout happening on Wall Street these days. News has now leaked that investment firms Goldman Sachs and Citigroup both received preferential H1N1 swine flu vaccines even while local clinics that treat school children had no supply. The uproar is reminding the public just how much special treatment Wall Street banks get -- both financially and medically -- while everyday people are hung out to dry.

Not only that, but taxpayers got to foot the bill for those H1N1 vaccines handed to Wall Street insiders. It's yet one more way in which the general public is being screwed over (yet again) by the swine flu vaccine agenda.

There's one politically incorrect question in all this that's just begging to be asked, and let's assume for the moment that H1N1 vaccines actually work to save lives even though they don't: If a dangerous viral pandemic sweeps through the nation, killing people left and right, are Wall Street investment bankers really the people we want to save first?

Seriously. Doesn't it seem that school children should get the medicine first and Wall Street insiders should get it last?

The CDC claims that the vaccines sent to these Wall Street companies should have only been given to "high-risk people" who worked there. Sure they were, because we all know that Wall Street companies adhere to the highest standards of ethics, morality and civic responsibility. These people are shining examples of glorious human beings who always do the right thing, even if it requires giving up something for the benefit of someone else, right? And if they were on a sinking Titanic, they'd give up the life boats to the poor women and children, right?

But the real story here isn't that H1N1 vaccines are now being preferentially given to the rich instead of the school children. The real story is that people are panicking to get their hands on a complete joke of a vaccine -- a chemical cocktail that has never been subjected to even a single scientific test proving it actually works. People are lining up, in other words, to attain supply of something that's totally useless.



The crumbling social fabric of America
At the same time, this fabricated emergency reveals to us the complete lack of ethics in the distribution of these vaccines to the Wall Street rich, even while everyday poor people stand in line waiting for their turn.

It's yet another powerful commentary on the crumbling social fabric of America -- a nation that puts its morally bankrupt money slingers as a higher priority than everyone else. It's the Wall Streeters who get the trillion-dollar bailouts that the rest of us must someday pay out of our pockets. It's the Wall Streeters who get preferential treatment by Washington. And it's the Wall Streeters who are now getting the medicine that should be going to our children.

Of course, the medicine itself is a joke, too, but that's beside the point: These people THINK the vaccines are valuable, so their decisions on where to send them first reveal their true intentions.

There's a huge moral lesson in all this, by the way: Even those who get the H1N1 vaccine receive no benefit from it. People whose immune systems adaptively respond to the vaccine by building antibodies are the very people who could have done the same thing automatically in response to influenza exposure. Meanwhile, those with suppressed immune systems that are vulnerable to H1N1 have no ability to adaptively produce H1N1 antibodies anyway. In other words, even if you believe the H1N1 vaccine actually works, it only works on the people who don't need it!

This is the ultimate comedy. People are desperately fighting over a chemical injection that will help no one. And the only reason they're so desperate about it is because the hysteria has been entirely fabricated precisely to create irrational demand (http://www.naturalnews.com/027404_h...).

Maybe we should send all the vaccines to Wall Street anyway. Let everybody else stand outside, waiting in lines and soaking up a little sunshine so that their bodies create the only thing that will really save them from influenza in the first place: Vitamin D.

Or better yet, We the People should charge Wall Street for these vaccines we paid for. And the price? One trillion dollars.

Sources for this story include:
WSJ
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB125...

Washington Post
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dy... Buzz up!8 votes



http://www.naturalnews.com/027415_Wall_Street_vaccines_H1N1.html

AIG Gets Another ($4.2) BILLION Dollar BailOut @ Txpyrs Expnse

American International Group Inc., the insurer rescued by the U.S., tapped the Treasury Department for another $4.2 billion to help restructure its money-losing mortgage guarantor and the plane unit it’s trying to sell.

AIG accessed about $2.1 billion from its Treasury facility on Aug. 13 and told the government today it would draw down another $2.1 billion, the New York-based company said in a regulatory filing. AIG got the $29.8 billion facility in April as part of its fourth bailout.

“It shows that they’re still having trouble getting cash to continue to run their operations” without government support, said Sandler O’Neill Partners LP analyst Paul Newsome. “That’s despite the fact you’ve had some really favorable things happen, like the credit markets getting better.”

AIG was bailed out in September 2008 to prevent losses at banks that bought derivatives from the insurer. The $182.3 billion rescue includes a $60 billion Federal Reserve credit line, up to $52.5 billion to buy mortgage-backed securities owned or backed by the insurer, and a Treasury investment of as much as $69.8 billion in two facilities. AIG has already drained one of the Treasury programs, valued at $40 billion.

AIG is using Treasury funds to buy shares of International Lease Finance Corp. held by one of its insurance units, the company said in the filing. The transfer may ease the eventual sale of Los Angeles-based ILFC or its assets, Newsome said.


But wait, I thought OMG AIG turned a profit?!

CNN Money:


AIG reported its second profitable quarter in a row early Friday, as stabilization in its insurance businesses, and the credit and mortgage markets helped boost results.

The troubled insurer said its net income rose to $455 million, or 68 cents per share, an improvement over the $24.5 billion loss from a year earlier. Results included a one-time net charge of $1.5 billion for capital losses and hedging.

Without the charge, AIG would have earned $1.9 billion in the quarter, or $2.85 per share. Analysts polled by Thomson Reuters, who typically exclude one-time events, forecasted earnings of $1.98 per share.

Sales for the New York-based company rose 189% to $26 billion, topping analysts' forecasts of $23 billion.

"Our results reflect continued stabilization in performance and market trends," said AIG Chief Executive Robert Benmosche in a statement. "AIG employees are working to preserve the strength of our insurance businesses in a challenging market."

In August, AIG reported that it had returned to profitability after six straight losing quarters, a stretch in which the company lost more than $100 billion.