NEWS IN BRIEF

Thursday, January 17, 2013

— First Federal exits

cease-desist order

The federal Office of the Comptroller of the Currency has terminated its cease-and-desist order against First Federal Bancshares of Arkansas, the Harrison-based bank said Wednesday.

The regulator issued the order against the bank holding company in April 2010 and ordered the bank to develop a capital plan and a business plan and not to pay any dividends.

Last year, Bear State Financial Holdings invested $46.3 million in First Federal and brought in a new management team to improve the condition of the bank.

Bear State is owned by about two dozen investors, including Joe and Scott Ford and Richard Massey, who were executives at Alltel Corp.

Bear State hired a new management team for the bank, including Massey as chairman, Dabbs Cavin as chief executive officer and Christopher Wewers as president and chief operating officer.

The terms of the deal were not released. The deal is expected to be finalized early this year, according to a release Wednesday.

Allegiance serves about 40,000 homes and businesses in Arkansas, Oklahoma, Kansas. Missouri and Texas, according to its website. The company offers bundled services including high-speed Internet, high definition television and phone service.

New York-based BCI Broadband was formed in 2012 by two former top executives of cable pioneer Bresnan Communications.

State index slips with 10 stocks down

The Arkansas Index, a price-weighted index that tracks the largest public companies based in the state, fell 0.46 to 252.06 Wednesday.

“U.S. stocks ended mixed on Wednesday after better-than-expected earnings from Goldman Sachs and JPMorgan offset some mixed economic data and a lowered global growth forecast by the World Bank,” said John Blackwell, senior vice president and managing director of equity trading at Stephens Inc. in Little Rock.

The Arkansas Index moved lower as 10 stocks declined, five advanced and one remained unchanged.

USA Truck gained 5.1 percent on average volume.

Arkansas Best dropped 2.6 percent in average trading.

The index was developed by Bloomberg News and the Arkansas Democrat-Gazette with a base value of 100 as of Dec. 30, 1997.

Business, Pages 25 on 01/17/2013