St. Petersburg community bank tops $1 billion in assets

First Home Bank has become the first community bank in St. Petersburg in four years to grow assets above $1 billion.

The bank, part of First Home Bancorp., ended the second quarter of 2020 on June 30 with $1.47 billion in assets, compared to $563 million on March 31.

The last community bank in St. Petersburg to top $1 billion in assets was C1 Bank, with $1.7 billion in assets when it was sold in 2016 to what is now Bank OZK. Prior to that, the largest bank in St. Petersburg was Republic Bank which had $2.9 billion in assets when it sold in 2004 to BB&T, now Truist Bank. Raymond James Bank, part of Raymond James Financial (NYSE: RJF), is a St. Petersburg-based bank, but with $33.6 billion in assets it is not considered a community bank.

First Home was one of a half-dozen locally based community banks to see assets grow in Q2 2020, compared to Q2 2019.

First Home Bank’s 161 percent jump in assets was attributable to the participation in the Paycheck Protection Program, a federal program designed to provide economic assistance during the Covid-19 pandemic, as well as significant growth in the bank’s core deposit base, a news release said. Some of those PPP loans came from a collaboration with Dynasty Financial Partners in St. Petersburg. Dynasty put the investment advisors it serves, as well as those advisors’ clients, in touch with bankers at First Home to get PPP loans.

As of June 30, First Home Bank had funded a total of $831 million in PPP loans, the news release said.

Anthony Leo, CEO, First Home Bank

First Home has funded more than twice the amount of PPP loans of any bank based in the greater Tampa Bay region, and by Aug. 5, 2020, the bank had provided PPP loans to more than 8,000 businesses saving more than 100,000 jobs, according to the news release.

“As a leading SBA lender, First Home has been on the frontlines of the economic recovery. We are proud to have originated more than $800 million PPP loans, providing needed capital to businesses in Tampa Bay and around the nation at this critical time,” said Anthony Leo, CEO.

The bank also had record production in its residential mortgage division, originating a total of $407 million in new mortgage loans.

For the six months ended June 30, First Home had $2.17 million in net income, compared to $2.3 million in net income in the first six months of 2019, according to a report filed with the Federal Financial Institutions Examination Council.

Here’s a look at net income for First Home and other locally based community banks.

First Home Bank has six full-serve banking centers in the Tampa Bay region: downtown St. Petersburg, Seminole, Pinellas Park and Clearwater, as well as Tampa and Sarasota.

NOTE: This story has been corrected to include C1 Bank.