Newark, Ohio-based Park National Corp. will acquire Dyersburg, Tennessee-based First Citizens Bancshares (not to be confused with First Citizens in neighboring North Carolina) in a roughly $317.3 million deal that’s expected to close in the first quarter of 2026, the banks said Monday.
The transaction would create an entity with roughly $12.5 billion in assets, $10.5 billion in deposits and $9.6 billion in loans, and push Park into the Volunteer State for the first time, with seven locations in the Memphis area, six near Chattanooga and three around Nashville.
“We’ve long seen Tennessee as a compelling market and were intentional about waiting for the right opportunity to expand,” Park President Matt Miller said in a statement. “This partnership is the right fit at the right time. It aligns with our long-term growth strategy and positions us to serve more people in meaningful ways.”
Indeed, serving Tennessee would connect Park’s two previously isolated swaths of territory: one encompassing Ohio and northern Kentucky; and the other, a handful of branches in North and South Carolina from two separate acquisitions the bank completed in 2018 and 2019.
First Citizens shareholders will own roughly 11% of the combined company once the transaction is complete. One First Citizens director will join Park’s board as part of the deal. Additionally, First Citizens CEO Jeff Agee will lead Park’s new Tennessee region.
“Partnering with Park is a natural and strategic step forward for our bank – one that reflects our commitment to our teammates, customers, communities and shareholders,” Agee said. “Together, we’re building a stronger, more impactful organization that will enhance our customers’ experience, create meaningful opportunities for our teammates and extend our ability to serve more communities.”
Agee told American Banker on Tuesday that First Citizens “felt [it] needed to grow a little more in Tennessee and expand" outside of the state.
"By year-end next year, we'll be $13 billion,” he said. “It would have taken us forever to get there."
First Citizens will also gain greater lending capacity for its commercial and small-business customers through Park, the banks said.
The transaction, meanwhile, would push Park past the $10 billion-asset threshold permanently. It counted $9.9 billion in assets as of Sept. 30 – and briefly crossed the $10 billion mark, necessitating stricter regulation, in 2021 and 2023. Buying First Citizens would add $2.6 billion in assets to the Ohio bank.
The tie-up would also stretch Park beyond a 100-location footprint. The bank lists 80 offices on its website. Acquiring First Citizens would add 24.
Park expects the transaction to be roughly 15% accretive to 2026 earnings per share, the bank said.
The deal continues a scorching pace for bank mergers and acquisitions for the fourth quarter – and for 2025 writ large. Seaport Research Partners analyst Laurie Havener Hunsicker said 140 bank deals had been announced this year, as of mid-October. That’s the highest total since 2022, when 156 transactions were proposed, she said.
But the Park deal is at least the fifth involving a Midwest bank in a seven-day span: Illinois-based HBT Financial agreed last Monday to acquire CNB Bank Shares for $170.2 million. Farmers National Bank Corp. said last Wednesday it would acquire fellow Ohio lender Middlefield Banc Corp. in a $299 million deal. Wisconsin-based Nicolet Bankshares said last Thursday it would buy Iowa-based MidWestOne Financial Group for $864 million. And in by far the biggest transaction of the group, Columbus, Ohio-based Huntington said it would buy Cadence Bank for $7.4 billion.
Last quarter, meanwhile, saw the most dealmaking among banks in four years, according to S&P Global Market Intelligence. Fifty-two U.S.-based bank deals were announced between July and September – the highest figure since the third quarter of 2021, which saw 59.
