Nevada County Picayune and Gurdon Times Newspaper Archive

First State Bank Selling Charter To Century Bancshares

A lot of legal maneuvering has been done, with the end result to be no change in regard to the First State Bank of Gurdon.

According to David Estes, President and Chief Executive Officer for Lonoke Bancshares, First State Bank's charter has been sold, but there will be no changes made as far as how the bank operates, or the people who work there.

Century Bancshares of New Boston, Texas, has filed an application seeking permission from the Federal Reserve System to purchase First State Bank's charter.

The charter would then be renamed and relocated to Texarkana, Ark. Only the charter would be involved.

Estes said First State Bank has been functioning under two charters and this will make more efficient to operate.

"This will be more cost effective with one charter," he said. "Prior to statewide banking, if the banks weren't in contiguous counties they had to have separate charters."

According to the notice of application, First State Bank will continue to operate under the same management and ownership, and maintain the same name.

Only the ownership would change. Under the application for relocation, the main office would be relocated from Gurdon to Texarkana, but this is the only change to be made.

Estes said the exact date of these transactions isn't known, but everything should be completed sometime in August.

Once the transactions are done, he said, First State will be able to offer more services, including automated teller machines (ATMs), Visa debit services and secondary market home loans.

"This would only enhance the services First State already offers," Estes said. "It's just a corporate consolidation for cost containment."