First Niagara is Coming to town (so long HSBC)

If you haven’t heard already – the HSBC branch in Liberty will become First Niagara next year. First Niagara is acquiring 195 branches, $15 billion of deposits and $2.8 billion in loans, from HSBC Bank USA NA in the Northeast in a $1 Billion all cash deal.

It’s too early to tell how this will affect your personal banking, but we do know that the Liberty branch will be remain open despite some rumors. The sale could be a good thing for our community since HSBC is a huge multi-national company and First Niagara is more of a regional company with branches in Pennsylvania, New York, Massachusetts, and Connecticut. First Niagara also likes to call itself a “community orientated” bank.

Here is some information provided by First Niagara:

“We are very pleased to acquire such a high-quality franchise that gives us an optimal footprint in Upstate New York and additional depth in Connecticut,” said First Niagara President and Chief Executive Officer John R. Koelmel. “This creates important density in our key legacy markets and allows us to further leverage our business model with greater scale in a region we know so well. We’ve been building an organization to support our vision for the future and I’m very proud of our team’s readiness to move forward with this opportunity on the heels of our three most recent acquisitions. The transaction is an exciting next step in advancing our growth strategy, strengthening the foundation in our home markets
and even better positioning the organization for the future. I am very confident in our ability to efficiently and successfully integrate these branches while fully meeting the needs of our new and existing customers and communities.”

There will be no changes to customer accounts or branches until after the transaction is completed, and First Niagara and HSBC are already collaborating to ensure a smooth transition for the businesses and individuals they serve.

First Niagara will strengthen its presence as a real leader in Upstate New York banking, nearly doubling its number of branches in the state to more than 200 and a greater than 20% deposit share across the region.

About First Niagara

First Niagara, through its wholly owned subsidiary, First Niagara Bank, N.A., is a multi-state community oriented bank with $31 billion in assets, $19 billion in deposits, 346 branches and 5,000 employees providing financial services to individuals, families and businesses across Upstate New York, Pennsylvania, Connecticut and Massachusetts. For more information, visit www.fnfg.com.

We’ll keep you posted as more becomes available