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BancorpSouth (BXS) Acquires Certain Assets of Waguespack

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The Mississippi-based financial holding company, BancorpSouth, Inc. declared that it has acquired certain assets of Waguespack & Associates Insurance, Inc., an independent insurance firm in Louisiana.

The acquisition was made through BancorpSouth Insurance Services, Inc. – a fully-owned subsidiary of BancorpSouth Bank – whose parent is BancorpSouth Inc. BancorpSouth Insurance currently ranks as the nation’s 37th largest insurance firm, with over 650 insurance and risk management professionals providing local expertise, backed by worldwide resources.

Founded in 1986, Waguespack is engaged in commercial and personal lines insurance services and currently produces annual revenues of nearly $3 million.

Per BancorpSouth Insurance President – Markham McKnight – “Waguespack’s core property/casualty, life and health business complements our personal and business solutions, and we believe our new relationship will benefit both current and prospective clients.”

Further, according to Waguespack’s president, Timothy A. Waguespack, this collaboration with BancorpSouth will enable Waguespack to provide its clients with a cluster of new services like risk management resources, loss control, health-care reform and other specialty services.

Background

BancorpSouth has traditionally focused on a strategy, which includes expanding and diversifying of its franchise in terms of revenues, profitability and asset size, while maintaining a relationship-based approach to banking. This strategy encompasses both organic growth and acquisitions of banks and financial services companies.

Further, the company enjoys a solid liquidity position to make strategic investments through mergers and acquisitions (M&A). In Dec 2013, the company announced that its insurance service wing – BancorpSouth Insurance – has acquired the assets of GEM Insurance Agencies, LP, for a cash consideration of $20.7 million. Also, in Apr 2014, BancorpSouth Insurance took over the assets of Lafayette, LA-based Knox Insurance Group, LLC (Knox).

We remain optimistic about BancorpSouth’s future growth prospects through inorganic routes, as the company looks forward to tap similar opportunities.

BancorpSouth currently carries a Zacks Rank #3 (Hold). Shares of the company have gained more than 24% so far this year, though they underperformed the 38.1% growth for the Zacks categorized Southeast Banks industry. The Zacks Consensus Estimate for the stock has remained unchanged at $1.54 per share, for the current year, over the past month.




 

Some better-ranked stocks in the same space include Carolina Financial Corp. , Access National Corp. and Farmers Capital Bank Corp. , each sporting a Zacks Rank #1 (Strong Buy). All the three stocks have delivered positive average earnings surprise over the trailing four quarters. You can see the complete list of today’s Zacks #1 Rank stocks here.

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