Uncle Sean's Update - 7/25/25

Happy Friday!!!
 
Join 18,000+ of your friends and colleagues and sign up here to receive the Uncle Sean Update and FinTech Cowboys interviews straight to your inbox every week (rumor has it that if I hit 20K, management will buy me a pizza 🍕😂)!  Here is the Uncle Sean Update for 7/25/25:
 

• Looking forward to economic updates next week including 1st advanced estimate of 2Q GDP, the FOMC meeting, July Jobs Report / Unemployment, and June PCE – oh and don’t forget to sign up for our Bankers Helping Bankers “Inside The Numbers” webinar set for July 30th at 10AM CDT (register here for free - https://lu.ma/Q22025InsidetheNumbers) with special guest Mr. William Chittenden, Ph.D. (Bill), President & CEO of SW Graduate School of Banking (SWGSB)!!!

 

• Speaking of free (one of Uncle Sean’s favorite f-words) – check out Alogent’s The Banking Buzz: Houston free one-day event tailored specifically for banks and credit unions (and lunch is included!) at the C. Baldwin Hotel in Houston, TX on August 26, 2025.  Space is limited so reserve your spot by August 10th (register by July 31 and be entered to win a YETI® Backpack Soft Cooler – oh yeah). 🤙

 

• 👏 Shoutout to my friends at DCI as Maxwell State Bank partners with DCI to bring future-facing digital banking technology directly to families, farmers, innovators, and businesses large and small as a bedrock of Iowan community banking.  Nice!!! 😊

 

• And of course a virtual fist-bump 👊 to good folks at Vine Financial as Triad Bank, National Association selects Vine's AI-powered commercial loan platform to streamline workflows and enable Triad’s team to scale while continuing to deliver relationship-driven commercial lending.

 

• Fiserv’s POS system Clover announced Clover PracticePay™ (launching early 2026) designed specifically to support small and medium-sized healthcare providers, in partnership with Rectangle Health.
  • And jumping the border to Canada - TD Bank Group signed a managed services agreement with Fiserv to enable TD Merchant Solutions to provide Clover to its customers.  As part of the agreement, Fiserv also entered into a purchase agreement with TD to acquire part of TD’s merchant processing business in Canada.

 

• Paychex partners with SoFi to bring the financial well-being resources and solutions of SoFi at Work to users of Paychex Flex® Perks platform.

 

• And much love 🫶 to my friends at Revio Insight as Capital Community Bank (CCBank; FDIC 33823; total assets $1.1B) partners with Revio Insight to enable CCBank to leverage data-driven strategies, delivering tailored experiences that deepen customer relationships and drive meaningful results.

 
 
👀 Let’s take a minute to look at the supercharged M&A activity with 10 announced deals in just the last week🔥🔥🔥:
 

• First up are a couple of CU acquisitions of banks:
  • 7/22 - San Francisco Federal Credit Union (charter 24542; total assets $1.3B) to acquire Summit Bank (FDIC 23864; total assets $280M) from Summit Bancshares, Inc. (FR 1029295).
    • Worth noting that Summit Bank, although smaller in size, has a significant concentration of commercial, multifamily, and C&I loans (combined is about 88% of the banks total loan portfolio as of the 6/30/25 call report).
  • 7/24 - OnPath Federal Credit Union (charter 14692; total assets $1.1B) to acquire Heritage Bank of St. Tammany (FDIC 29577; total assets $184M) from Heritage Nola Bancorp, Inc. (FR 5110324).
    • 👉 If you’re keeping score, these two deals now account for 9 announced CU acquisition of a bank thus far for 2025 (whole-bank acquisition – not just a branch purchase).  This compares to 22 for 2024, 11 in 2023, 16 in 2022, 13 in 2021, 7 in 2020, and 16 in 2019 (source: FedFis M&A database).

 

• Now onto the rest of the bank deals over the last few days 😲:
  • 7/18 – Bank First Corporation (Nasdaq: BFC; FR 1208009), bank sub is Bank First, N.A. (FDIC 5304; total assets $4.5B), to acquire Centre 1 Bancorp, Inc. (PCO FR 1209042), bank sub is The First National Bank and Trust Company (FDIC 5285; total assets $1.5B).
  • 7/18 - Prosperity Bancshares, Inc. (NYSE: PB; FR 1109599), bank sub is Prosperity Bank (FDIC 16835; total assets $38.7B), to acquire American Bank Holding Corporation (PCO FR 1109964), bank sub is American Bank, N.A. (FDIC 20241; total assets $2.5B).
  • 7/18 – GreatAmerica Holdings, Inc. (no FR yet) to become a bank holding company and acquire Delhi Bancshares, Inc. (PCO FR 1205594), bank subsidiary is Heritage Bank (FDIC 18463; total assets $40M).  After the acquisition, Heritage Bank will be renamed to GreatAmerica Bank National Association.
  • 7/21 – First Community Bankshares, Inc. (NASDAQ: FCBC; FR 1478017), bank sub is First Community Bank (FDIC 13012; total assets $3.2B), to acquire Hometown Bancshares, Inc. (PCO FR 2687580), bank sub is Union Bank, Inc. (FDIC 16620; total assets $402M).
  • 7/22 – Mercantile Bank Corporation (NASDAQ: MBWM; FR 2608763), bank sub is Mercantile Bank (FDIC 34598; total assets $6.1B), to acquire Eastern Michigan Financial Corporation (PCO FR 1129467), bank sub is Eastern Michigan Bank (FDIC 982; total assets $504M).
  • 7/23 - Colony Bankcorp, Inc. (NYSE: CBAN; FR 1085170), bank subsidiary is Colony Bank (FDIC 22257; total assets $3.2B), to acquire TC Bancshares, Inc. (OTCQX: TCBC; PCO FR 5587421), bank subsidiary is TC Federal Bank (FDIC 29331; total assets $571M).
  • 7/24 - East Texas Financial Corporation (PCO FR 1427556), bank subsidiary is Citizens Bank (FDIC 16817; total assets $488M), to acquire Texas National Bancorporation, Inc. (PCO FR 2716471), bank subsidiary is Texas National Bank of Jacksonville (FDIC 26181; total assets $848M).
  • And the bombshell 💥…  7/24 - Pinnacle Financial Partners (Nasdaq: PNFP; FR 2925657), bank subsidiary is Pinnacle Bank (FDIC 35583; total assets $54B), to acquire Synovus Financial Corp. (NYSE: SNV; FR 1078846), bank subsidiary is (FDIC 873; total assets $60B) in an all-stock transaction valued at $8.6 billion. 💰
    • Check out their really cool Investor Presentation Deck.

 

• 👉👉👉 Perhaps most interesting to me as an analysis nerd 🤓, is looking at the primary vendor tech stack (core, online, and mobile) of the target institutions – you get a quick look at the vendors who are getting hit hard from M&A (as well as a faster earn-back period for entities with shared tech profiles due to simplified integrations).  For more info – reach out to Bobby Button here at FedFis and ask him about our Fintegration Ecosystem© data for banks and CU’s.  Now THAT was a great plug!!! 🤠

 
 
Okay, back to the rest of the Update:
 

• Flagstar is looking to dissolve its holding company into the bank in an effort to further reduce costs; and streamline operations and regulatory oversight (would remove the Federal Reserve Board from regulatory oversight, leaving the OCC as its primary regulator).
  • The resulting entity will continue to be known as Flagstar Bank, N.A. (FDIC 32541) and its common stock will continue to trade on the New York Stock Exchange ("NYSE") under the same ticker symbol currently used by the holding company – "FLG".

 

• Greenlight (family banking app) announced an integration with Q2’s Digital Banking Platform via the Q2 Partner Accelerator Program.  As part of the Q2 Partner Accelerator Program, financial institutions can offer their account holders Greenlight's debit card and mobile app experience directly within their Q2 digital banking application.

 

• 2UniFi [a new financial ecosystem for SMB’s launched by National Bank Holdings Corporation (NYSE: NBHC)] partners with Nav (credit and financial health platform for small businesses).  As part of the initial collaboration, 2UniFi will be integrated within the Nav marketplace for small business deposit and lending solutions.

 

• Branch adds Lead Bank (FDIC 8283; total assets $1.75B) as a new strategic BaaS sponsor bank and card issuing partner for Branch’s workforce payments solutions (includes a digital bank account and debit card) and custom branded payment solutions for businesses. 
  • 👉 Uncle Sean is seeing more and more of this (multiple sponsor banks).  Sometimes is a precursor for a sponsor issuer replacement; sometimes it’s for a new product specialty (i.e. separate sponsor bank for lending side versus deposit side); and sometimes it is a simple act of “supply chain diversity” to counter single vendor concentration risk from the fintech perspective.  Chime is a good example of this with Stride Bank and The Bancorp Bank both as sponsor issuers to the Chime Visa debit card.
    • For a real-world example - one doesn’t have to look too long at the HMBradley failure a few years back once Hatch Bank told them they could not take on any more deposit growth (rapid deposit growth can create capital issues for a bank) – right at the time that HMBradley was needing to scale more.
      • Source - https://www.bankingdive.com/news/neobank-hmbradley-shifts-to-invite-only-seeks-more-partner-banks/603792/…

 

• Rakuten (online loyalty and rewards shopping platform) announced the launch of the Rakuten American Express® Card issued by First Electronic Bank and powered by Imprint.
  • CNBC has a really good article highlighting Imprint and their strengthening presence in the co-branded card market that has typically been dominated by big banks.

 

• Mastercard unveils AI Card Design Studio giving card issuers a powerful, intuitive solution to bring their brand to life.  “What once took weeks can now be completed in minutes—accelerating go-to-market timelines while enabling more creative flexibility and emotional impact.”

 

• Apiture launches real-time payment capabilities for its community bank and credit union clients allowing for 24/7/365 payment facilitation through The Clearing House RTP® network and the Federal Reserve’s FedNow® Service.

 

• Samsung Electronics America is partnering with Splitit to offer installment payments to Samsung wallet; allowing users to pay over time, with a variety of available payment schedules, using their existing card to make in-store purchases at point of sale.
  • The article notes that installment sales have become common for e-commerce purchases, but have been slow to catch on at in-store POS.

 

• Some personnel moves:
  • Congrats to Marissa Venuto for her promotion to COO at Castellum.AI per this LinkedIn post.
  • Congratulations to Jaimeson Rice with his promotion to CEO at Pinwheel, succeeding Co-Founder Kurtis Lin, who is transitioning to Executive Chairman of the Pinwheel Board of Directors.
  • And congratulations to Bill Briggs as he is sworn in as Deputy Administrator of the U.S. Small Business Administration.

 

• Notable FinTech funding for the week:
  • Quavo (fraud and dispute management for FI’s) raised $300M in Capital from Spectrum Equity.  Existing investor FINTOP Capital to sell their ownership stake in the transaction.
  • Nav (business credit builder / monitoring platform with business debit card and charge card issued by Thread Bank) raised $5M in Capital from NBHC as part of the strategic 2UniFi partnership mentioned above.

 
 
Random Uncle Sean stuff:

• The heat index hit 110 degrees here this week in East Texas – which means Walmart should have their Christmas stuff out any day now. 😊
• Okay – let’s get to the good stuff as I feel like there may be an ice cold adult beverage or two 🍺 in my near future to kick the weekend off!!!  Yep, here are the Dad / Bad Jokes for the week:
  • Its so hot outside that when I opened the front door I thought I was checking on my cornbread!!! 🥵
  • The age conundrum…  When it takes you longer to get over a good time than to have it… 🍷🙃
  • At my age, it’s important to get out of the house every once in a while – to remind yourself why you don’t go out anymore!!! 😜
  • Aunt Patty said I can be an idiot sometimes…  Pretty cool of her to give me permission like that!!! 🤪❤️
  • And saving the best for last….  If being chased by a taxidermist, whatever you do – do NOT play dead!!!! 😲🤣

 
 
Have a GREAT weekend and please stay safe!
 
Uncle Sean
 
 
Sometimes known as Sean Mayo – contact me directly for scope and pricing of custom reports / analysis projects at [email protected] | 214-604-6961 – or you can contact FedFis Sales Team at 512-960-0911 | [email protected] #FedFisHasTheData FedFis
 
FedFis, LLC disclaimer – The views and opinions of Uncle Sean are of his own and may not necessarily represent the views, endorsements, and/or opinions of FedFis, LLC – we all know he’s a little bit different; but that’s why we love him.