PEACHTREE CITY, Ga.–(GLOBE NEWSWIRE)–Kenneth H. Maloy, President and CEO of SouthCrest Financial Group, Inc. (OTCBB:SCSG) announced today that the company has completed the consolidation of its four bank charters as of February 28, 2014. “We are very pleased to announce we are now one bank, SouthCrest Bank, N.A., and all of our customers in Georgia and Alabama now have high-touch service over a much larger footprint,” stated Mr. Maloy. “This success is the result of countless hours of dedication and hard work by our employees. Their commitment has been herculean, given the fact that the difficulty of this task has been compounded by two snow and ice storms during the past four weeks.”
The consolidation closely follows SCFG’s $17.5MM capital raise and its reduction of the company’s NPAs to under 2% of average assets in 4Q13. “With this added agility, SouthCrest can now begin to focus on profitability and growth in our primary markets, as well as increasing activity in contiguous metro areas such as Chattanooga, Birmingham, and Montgomery,” stated Mr. Maloy. “We have already seen some savings in our operational expenses, and we are optimistic that we will exceed the 0.20% of assets of our original estimated cost savings through enhanced efficiencies.”