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Eleven PA Banks Weathering the Storm in Financials

September 30, 2008 – Comments (0) | RELATED TICKERS: PNC , FCF , NWSB

Amidst turmoil in the financial sector this week and over the past year, the following is a list of Pennsylvania-based banks and financial services companies with market caps over $100M that have recorded stock price gains over the past year.

The 11 companies are listed in descending order by 52-week stock price performance (through 9/14/08) and include the following top performers: Univest – biggest gainer at 38%, First Commonwealth (which I wrote about 15 months ago with a yield over 6%) – biggest dividend yield at 5.4%, and PNC Financial – biggest market cap at $25.3B. With Dow component American International Group (AIG) down over 30% on Friday, and other blow-ups this week such as Lehman Brothers (LEH) and Washington Mutual (WM), the strength in these Keystone State banks is notable and reflects investor confidence in their management and business fundamentals.

Company Name (Ticker), 52-Week Change, Market Cap, Dividend Yield

Univest Corp. of PA (UVSP) +38.0%, $380M, 2.7% Beneficial Mutual Bancorp (BNCL) +27.9%, $991M, 0% Republic First Bancorp (FRBK) +23.2%, $108M, 0% Citizens & Northern Corp. (CZNC) +21.4%, $197M, 4.4% First Commonwealth Financial (FCF) +15.7%, $924M, 5.4% Bryn Mawr Bank Corp. (BMTC) +6.7%, $199M, 2.4% PNC Financial Services (PNC) +6.6%, $25.3B, 3.6% Abington Bancorp (ABBC) +6.5%, $248M, 2.0% S&T Bancorp (STBA) +3.5%, $954M, 3.6% ESB Financial Corp. (ESBF) +2.9%, $126M, 3.9% Northwest Bancorp (NWSB) +1.7%, $1.4B, 3.1%

My favorite picks going forward include PNC, FCF, and NWSB.