Banking

In a year when rising interest rates kept the banking industry on its toes, two of Richmond’s biggest financial institutions in particular grabbed repeated headlines.

One of Richmond’s biggest financial institutions has closed out the year by taking a small Charlottesville credit union under its wing.

As it awaits construction of its first Richmond-area branch near Willow Lawn, the $45 billion Pennsylvania-based bank has already scouted out a second location in the region.

Richmond’s biggest bank agreed to pay $1.5 million in penalties and repay at least $5 million to affected customers to settle charges that it illegally enrolled thousands in checking account overdraft programs without proper disclosures.

It’s been nearly a decade since a bank operated on the grounds of the western Henrico mall. That may soon change.

The merger is another example of a long-running trend of older, smaller credit unions looking to be merged into larger peers.

They were part of a round of closures of eight of the bank’s 32 branches that occurred Oct. 31, leaving Primis with 24 branches and expected to save the bank millions per year.

Looking ahead to the unveiling next month of this year’s RVA 25 rankings, BizSense checked in with Sterling Point Advisors, which turned heads atop last year’s list with whopping 15,000 percent growth rate.

The firm, launched by a group that broke away from a local bank, is already on the move and has additional expansion in mind.

Of the 27 banks with a retail presence in the local market, 16 reported a decline in deposits in their Richmond-area locations over the last year.