Independent Banker - May 2023 - 38

Q&A
More than
$1 billion
BY ROSHAN MCARTHUR
BILL WIEDEL
President and CEO |
CFG Community Bank
Q: What sets your
community bank apart?
A: We pride ourselves
on being more than a traditional bank. We
embrace our entrepreneurial spirit and
take a bold approach in everything we do.
Where many banks see obstacles, we see
opportunity and actively seek solutions to
those challenges, allowing us to achieve
what many others cannot.
#6
CFG Community
Bank
Baltimore, Md.
Assets: $4.3 billion
thecfgbank.com
Q: How would you describe the
bank's culture?
A: Our vision is to have a company
culture that feels and operates like
a family-run business, supporting
and celebrating everyone's
individuality, goals and successes.
Q: In what ways is CFG
Community Bank innovating?
A: Our success has allowed us
to make long-term investments
in our business, which have
greatly improved the customer
experience. We also have the
ability to syndicate/securitize
commercial loans, which
increases our capacity to do more
business, helping more of our
clients to grow and succeed.
In 2021, we identified a
need in the marketplace for
more efficient financing to the
cannabis industry.
We began by offering
customized lending solutions to
cannabis businesses and have
since embraced the industry
further to also offer deposit
solutions to cannabis clients.
We are one of few banks in
the country that offer lending
and deposit solutions to the
cannabis industry, and now it is
a successful dedicated line of
business for us. We're proud to
help businesses that create jobs,
fuel the economy and provide
medical relief to many.
In their own
words...
SUSHIL PATEL
President | State Bank of Texas
There are some
characteristics of our bank
that really set us apart. We
are owner operated. That plays a big role in our decision
making and our ability to adapt quickly to what we see in
the marketplace. We're also a niche lender. We focus on
hospitality lending, and that focus has drawn upon the
owners' and board of directors' experience in hotel lending.
Combined, they own about 165 hotels around the country.
All of our clients are family businesses. We feel like
that is part of the success for our clients and our bank,
because we think closely watched and operated businesses
are more nimble.
We never seek growth, but we're opportunistic.
During the pandemic, many lenders stopped lending to
hotels, and it created an opportunity for us to get new
clientele that maybe would not have come to our bank
or would not have known about our bank. During the
pandemic, clients realized the value of having a lender who
you can contact via their cell phone at any time.
I'm very proud of how we are able to finance new
hotel owners who might not be able to get loans
through other banks because
they are looking at them from
a credit risk standpoint. We
look at them as starting out
their business and their family
entrepreneurship journey. And
we want to be a part of that.
We see our bank
continuing on this path
because it's worked for us.
And if it's not broke, then we're
not going to fix it. We're just
going to make it better.
#1
State Bank of Texas
Dallas, Texas
Assets: $2.1 billion
3-year average pre-tax
ROA: 4.46
statebnk.com
38 // ICBA Independent Banker // May 2023
http://www.thecfgbank.com http://www.statebnk.com
Independent Banker - May 2023

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