Ga. bank failure brings 2012 total to 50

[November 17, 2012]  WASHINGTON (AP) -- Regulators say they have closed a bank in Georgia, bringing to 50 the number of U.S. bank failures this year.

The Federal Deposit Insurance Corp. on Friday seized Hometown Community Bank, based in Braselton, Ga.

The bank had roughly $124.6 million in assets and $108.9 million in deposits as of Sept. 30.

CertusBank NA, based in Easley, S.C., agreed to assume all the deposits and buy essentially all the assets of the failed bank.

The failure of Hometown Community Bank is expected to cost the deposit insurance fund $36.7 million.

Hometown Community Bank, which had two branches, is the tenth FDIC-insured institution to fail in Georgia this year.

U.S. bank closures are running at a much slower pace than in 2011. By this time last year, 88 banks had failed.

Bank closures peaked in 2010 in the wake of the financial crisis. In 2007, just three banks went under. That number jumped to 25 in 2008, after the meltdown, and ballooned to 140 in 2009.

In 2010 regulators seized 157 banks, the most in any year since the savings and loan crisis two decades ago. The FDIC has said 2010 likely was the high-water mark for bank failures from the Great Recession. They declined to a total of 92 in 2011.

From 2008 through 2011, bank failures cost the deposit insurance fund an estimated $88 billion. The fund fell into the red in 2009. But with failures slowing, the fund's balance turned positive in the second quarter of last year. By June 30 it stood at $22.7 billion, up from $15.3 billion at the end of March.

The FDIC expects bank failures from 2012 through 2016 to cost $10 billion.

[Associated Press]

Copyright 2012 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.