RALEIGH, NC, March 9 /PRNewswire-FirstCall/ -- RBC Centura Bank announced today that it has completed the acquisition of 39 AmSouth Bank branches in Huntsville, Decatur, Mobile, Montgomery, Selma and Tuscaloosa, Ala. This acquisition, which marks RBC Centura's entry into Alabama, makes it the state's seventh largest bank with approximately $1.5 billion in loans and $2 billion in deposits.
"Moving into Alabama with immediate scale and assets complements our growth strategy across the Southeast," said RBC Centura Chairman and CEO Scott Custer. "We are excited to expand our banking region to six states, and we believe Alabama is a good economic and cultural fit for the bank. It closely resembles other dynamic markets in the Southeast where RBC Centura has enjoyed a long-time presence and success."
The U.S. Department of Justice and the Federal Reserve Board required that the branches be divested in connection with AmSouth's merger with Regions Financial Corporation.
About RBC Centura Bank
RBC Centura Bank, headquartered in Raleigh, NC, is a wholly owned subsidiary of Royal Bank of Canada (RY on the NYSE and TSX) offering a wide range of financial services and advice, including a complete line of banking, and mortgage services to individuals, businesses and public institutions throughout the Southeast. RBC Centura's multi-faceted customer access network includes more than 330 full-service banking centers, an extensive ATM network, and telephone and Internet banking. In addition, RBC Centura offers builder finance products through its RBC Builder Finance division. According to SNL Financial, RBC Centura is the 46th largest U.S. bank based on assets as of fourth quarter 2006. Additional information about RBC Centura may be found at http://www.rbccentura.com/.
Safe Harbor Regarding Forward-Looking Statements
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Certain statements contained in this press release may be deemed to be forward-looking statements under certain securities laws, including the "safe harbor" provisions of the United States Private Securities Litigation Reform Act of 1995 and in any applicable Canadian securities legislation, and Royal Bank of Canada ("RBC") intends that such forward-looking statements be subject to the safe-harbor created thereby. The words "may," "could," "should," "would," "suspect," "outlook," "believe," "plan," "anticipate," "estimate," "expect," "intend," "forecast", "objective" and words and expressions of similar import are intended to identify forward-looking statements.
By their very nature, forward-looking statements involve numerous assumptions, and inherent risks and uncertainties, both general and specific, and risks exist that predictions, forecasts, projections and other forward-looking statements about the acquisition of branches from AmSouth Bancorporation ("AmSouth") by RBC Centura will not be achieved. We caution readers not to place undue reliance on these statements as a number of important factors could cause our actual results to differ materially from the beliefs, plans, objectives, expectations, anticipations, estimates and intentions expressed in such forward-looking statements. These factors include, but are not limited to the possibility that the Alabama economy and business spending does not continue to grow as expected, or that the anticipated benefits of the transaction are not realized as a result of such things as the strength of the economy and competitive factors in the areas where the AmSouth branches do business; the impact of changes in the laws and regulations regulating financial services and enforcement thereof (including banking, insurance and securities); judicial judgments and legal proceedings; RBC Centura's ability to integrate the AmSouth branches with RBC Centura successfully; reputational risks, and other factors that may affect future results of RBC including changes in trade policies, timely development and introduction of new products and services, changes in tax laws, and technological and regulatory changes .
We caution that the foregoing list of important factors is not exhaustive. Additional information about other important factors can be found under the Risk management section in our Q1 2007 Report to Shareholders and under the Risk management and Additional risks that may affect future results sections in our 2006 Annual Report.
RBC assumes no obligation to update the forward-looking statements contained in this press release.
