Which under-$10B U.S. banks grew their loan books fastest in the most recent full-year Call Report cycle? Using December 31, 2025 Call Report data in Banking Intelligence and comparing it with December 31, 2024, we ranked active U.S. banks below $10 billion in assets by year-over-year loan-book growth.[1]
Important scope note: this is an under-$10B bank ranking, not the FDIC’s formal community-bank definition.[4] That distinction matters. The screen includes traditional community banks, but it also includes private banks, specialty lenders, foreign-owned U.S. banks, card-heavy banks, and acquisition-affected institutions. The table is useful precisely because it shows where loan growth appeared across the smaller-bank market, but readers should not treat every row as the same kind of community-bank story.
Important M&A note: the top of the ranking is not a clean organic-growth league table. ChoiceOne’s 2025 growth was heavily affected by the Fentura transaction, which added roughly $1.4 billion of loans and $1.4 billion of deposits.[5] German American’s Heartland acquisition and CNB’s ESSA acquisition also explain a large part of their reported 2025 loan growth.[7][8] Macatawa should be read with corporate-provenance context as well, following Wintrust’s 2024 acquisition of Macatawa Bank Corporation.[6] A practical rule: any one-year loan-book growth rate above roughly 25% deserves an acquisition and portfolio-transfer check before it is benchmarked against organic lenders.
Key Findings
- The eligible universe contained 315 active U.S. banks with under $10 billion in assets as of 2025-12-31 and at least $100 million in loans one year earlier.
- The top 50 posted average year-over-year loan-book growth of 24.0%, versus 6.3% for the full eligible universe.
- The top 50 also posted average deposit growth of 20.1%, versus 5.8% for the full universe. Only two of the 50 had negative deposit growth.
- The fastest growers were not all built the same way. The main growth engines were acquisition, deposit-funded relationship growth, and specialty or card-oriented lending.
- The loan-mix signal is more about specialty exposure than generic commercial banking. Weighted C&I exposure was 18.0% of loans for the top 50 versus 16.3% for the full universe, but credit-card exposure was 4.7% versus 1.6%, almost a 3x gap.
- The top 50 were less concentrated in 1-4 family residential lending and nonfarm nonresidential CRE than the broader under-$10B bank pool.
- Fast growth did not automatically mean weak economics: 33 of the top 50 generated ROA of at least 1.00%, and 34 ran efficiency ratios below 60%.
- Credit quality still needs a second screen. The top 50 median NPL ratio was 0.75%, modestly above the 0.59% median for the broader eligible universe.
- Funding discipline is the main forward-looking risk. Eleven of the top 50 finished 2025 with loan-to-deposit ratios above 100%.
Read This Ranking In Three Buckets
1. Acquisition-led growers. ChoiceOne, German American, and CNB are the clearest examples. Their reported Call Report growth is real balance-sheet growth, but it is not the same thing as branch-level or banker-level organic production. These banks belong in the table, but the analytical question is integration quality, deposit retention, credit marks, and post-deal organic growth, not simply who grew fastest.
2. Deposit-funded relationship growers. Banks such as Needham Bank, Northpointe Bank, Metro City Bank, Old Second, Colony Bank, Citizens & Northern, Camden National, BankFirst, Bravera, Bar Harbor, and SmartBank are more useful for readers looking for repeatable community-bank growth patterns. Even here, the best signal is not loan growth by itself; it is loan growth plus deposit growth, L/D ratio, profitability, and NPL trend.
3. Specialty, private-bank, card, and foreign-owned profiles. Merrick, Celtic, WEX Bank, The Bancorp Bank, Principal Bank, Bessemer Trust, Mizrahi Tefahot, State Bank of India, Banco do Brasil Americas, Bradesco, Banesco USA, and several others are not wrong to include, but they should be compared with the right peers. Card receivables, specialty finance, private-bank balance sheets, and foreign-owned U.S. branches can produce very different growth, ROA, funding, and credit behavior than a locally owned CRE-and-C&I community bank.
Top 10 At A Glance
- ChoiceOne Bank: the headline growth rate is acquisition-led. The better read is whether Fentura integration preserves deposits and converts acquired scale into durable earnings.
- Macatawa Bank: very low NPLs and strong growth, but corporate context matters because Macatawa became part of Wintrust in 2024.
- Merrick Bank: a specialty/card-heavy profile; 52.2% loan-book growth with a 104.1% L/D ratio and 4.64% NPL ratio should not be compared casually with traditional CRE-heavy banks.
- Mizrahi Tefahot Bank: a foreign-owned U.S. bank profile with very strong loan and deposit growth, but not a typical local community-bank read.
- German American Bank: reported growth is heavily affected by the Heartland transaction; organic performance is better assessed after separating acquired balances.
- CNB Bank: ESSA added scale in loans, deposits, and offices; the useful 2026 question is whether the combined franchise can keep growing organically after the deal effect rolls off.
- Celtic Bank: very high ROA with high L/D and elevated NPLs; this is specialty-lender economics, not plain-vanilla balance-sheet expansion.
- Needham Bank: deposit growth slightly exceeded loan growth, which is healthy, but the bank still finished above 100% L/D.
- Northpointe Bank: deposit growth also ran ahead of loan growth, yet the 129.3% L/D ratio makes funding mix the key follow-up question.
- Old Second National Bank: a cleaner balanced-growth row: 31.6% loan-book growth, positive deposit support, 1.46% ROA, and an L/D ratio below 100%.
What The Fastest Growers Are Actually Doing
1. They are coordinating loans and deposits
The strongest cohort-level pattern is not simply faster lending. It is faster lending paired with faster deposit gathering. The top 50 averaged 20.1% deposit growth, and 48 of the 50 had positive deposit growth. That matters because loan growth without funding support eventually shows up in higher deposit pricing, more wholesale funding, more FHLB reliance, or an L/D ratio that moves too far too fast.
The row-level differences matter. Needham, Northpointe, and Metro City all grew deposits faster than loans, but each still finished above 100% L/D. That tells you deposit momentum was helpful, yet starting liquidity position and asset mix still matter. Old Second, Colony, Citizens & Northern, BankFirst, Bravera, and SmartBank look more balanced on this specific measure because loan growth was meaningful while L/D stayed below 100%.
2. The top rows mix acquisition growth with organic growth
The ranking becomes much more useful once acquisition-affected rows are labeled. ChoiceOne’s 94.9% loan-book growth is not a comparable organic-growth signal; Fentura supplied a large acquired loan and deposit base.[5] German American’s Heartland transaction similarly drove much of its 2025 reported loan increase, with management separately disclosing lower organic growth outside acquired loans.[7] CNB’s ESSA transaction added roughly $1.7 billion in loans and $1.5 billion in deposits; CNB also disclosed full-year organic loan growth of 4.83% excluding ESSA.[8]
That does not make these banks less interesting. It changes the diligence question. For acquisition-led growers, the important 2026 metrics are deposit retention, branch consolidation, acquired-credit performance, cost saves, and whether organic loan growth remains visible once purchase-accounting noise and acquired balances are separated.
3. Specialty and card exposure explain more than C&I alone
The top 50 were only modestly more C&I-heavy than the full under-$10B universe: 18.0% of loans versus 16.3%. The sharper difference was credit-card exposure: 4.7% versus 1.6%. That gap changes how the ranking should be read. Card and specialty-finance portfolios can produce higher yields and faster receivable growth, but they also bring different loss timing, capital density, funding sensitivity, and operational risk.
Merrick and WEX are the obvious examples, but the broader point is methodological. A loan-growth screen that does not separate specialty balance sheets from relationship banks can overstate how much growth is available to a typical community-bank lender. The ranking is a starting point; the portfolio mix explains what kind of growth it is.
4. Profitability separates durable growth from purchased volume
Fast growth is not automatically bad. The top 50 average ROA was 1.37%, slightly above the 1.20% average for the full eligible universe. A majority also ran efficiency ratios below 60%. That is why the best names in the table are not merely lenders with bigger balances; they are banks where loan growth, funding, expense control, and credit quality stayed in rough alignment.
The exceptions are just as instructive. SMBC MANUBANK had strong deposit growth but negative ROA. Cornerstone Capital Bank had 23.2% loan-book growth with negative deposit growth, a 131.0% L/D ratio, and a 4.72% NPL ratio. SouthEast Bank grew loans 22.0%, but its NPL ratio was 3.45%. These are not automatic red flags, but they are exactly where a ranking should turn into a credit and funding review.
5. CRE and liquidity risk need to be read together, not collapsed into one metric
The 2006 interagency CRE concentration guidance does not set a hard lending cap. It gives supervisory criteria used to identify banks that may warrant further analysis: construction, land development, and other land loans at 100% or more of total risk-based capital, or total CRE loans at 300% or more of total risk-based capital combined with 50% or more CRE growth over the prior 36 months.[3] A high L/D ratio is not itself the CRE test.
Still, the combination of rapid loan growth, high CRE concentration, rising L/D, and heavier non-core funding is where risk management questions become more serious. The FDIC’s Q4 2025 Quarterly Banking Profile showed industry loan growth accelerating, community-bank loans rising 5.4% year over year, and continued monitoring of weakness in certain portfolios, including CRE and credit cards.[2] For this ranking, the practical screen is simple: fast growth is more attractive when deposits, capital, credit quality, and liquidity are moving with it.
The Ranking: Top 50 Banks Under $10B By Year-Over-Year Loan-Book Growth
The table below ranks eligible banks by year-over-year growth in reported loans from 2024-12-31 to 2025-12-31. The Growth Read column is an editorial classification from Deep Digital Ventures, not a Call Report field.
| Rank | Bank | State | Growth Read | Assets 12/31/25 | Loans 12/31/24 | Loans 12/31/25 | YoY Loan-Book Growth | YoY Deposit Growth | ROA | NPL Ratio | L/D Ratio |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | ChoiceOne Bank | MI | Acquisition-led | $4.41B | $1.54B | $2.99B | 94.9% | 60.0% | 0.79% | 0.90% | 83.1% |
| 2 | Macatawa Bank, National Association | MI | Affiliate/M&A context | $3.66B | $1.65B | $2.69B | 63.2% | 11.8% | 1.39% | 0.14% | 87.8% |
| 3 | Merrick Bank | UT | Card/specialty | $9.25B | $4.96B | $7.55B | 52.2% | 35.5% | 1.16% | 4.64% | 104.1% |
| 4 | Mizrahi Tefahot Bank, Ltd. | CA | Foreign-owned U.S. bank | $8.66B | $1.91B | $2.78B | 45.9% | 48.4% | 0.00% | 1.59% | 68.7% |
| 5 | German American Bank | IN | Acquisition-led | $8.38B | $4.09B | $5.81B | 42.0% | 29.9% | 1.46% | 0.51% | 82.4% |
| 6 | CNB Bank | PA | Acquisition-led | $8.37B | $4.55B | $6.42B | 41.0% | 30.3% | 1.04% | 0.61% | 90.0% |
| 7 | Celtic Bank | UT | Specialty; L/D watch | $4.79B | $2.82B | $3.93B | 39.6% | 25.5% | 4.12% | 2.81% | 114.3% |
| 8 | Needham Bank | MA | Deposit growth matched; L/D watch | $6.93B | $4.29B | $5.97B | 38.9% | 40.1% | 0.90% | 0.73% | 101.8% |
| 9 | Northpointe Bank | MI | Deposit growth ahead; high L/D | $7.02B | $4.63B | $6.32B | 36.4% | 42.6% | 1.39% | 1.44% | 129.3% |
| 10 | Old Second National Bank | IL | Balanced relationship growth | $6.90B | $3.94B | $5.18B | 31.6% | 16.8% | 1.46% | 1.02% | 91.6% |
| 11 | Colony Bank | GA | Balanced | $3.72B | $1.86B | $2.44B | 30.8% | 19.3% | 0.92% | 0.96% | 78.7% |
| 12 | Forbright Bank | MD | Commercial/specialty tilt | $7.92B | $4.28B | $5.60B | 30.7% | 20.7% | 1.35% | 1.32% | 82.3% |
| 13 | Metro City Bank | GA | Deposit growth ahead; L/D watch | $4.71B | $3.14B | $4.04B | 28.4% | 33.0% | 1.80% | 0.65% | 109.9% |
| 14 | State Bank of India | IL | Foreign-owned; high L/D | $4.78B | $3.47B | $4.36B | 25.5% | 11.6% | 0.00% | — | 134.3% |
| 15 | Stride Bank, National Association | OK | Balanced growth | $4.86B | $3.32B | $4.12B | 24.0% | 24.0% | 2.10% | 0.77% | 92.2% |
| 16 | Citizens & Northern Bank | PA | Traditional; balanced | $3.12B | $1.88B | $2.32B | 23.8% | 22.4% | 0.92% | 1.42% | 89.9% |
| 17 | Cornerstone Capital Bank, SSB | TX | Funding and credit watch | $2.47B | $1.39B | $1.72B | 23.2% | -5.2% | 0.69% | 4.72% | 131.0% |
| 18 | Northeast Bank | ME | Specialty/commercial; high L/D | $4.95B | $3.58B | $4.37B | 22.1% | 21.5% | 2.01% | 0.81% | 113.3% |
| 19 | SouthEast Bank | TN | Credit-quality watch | $3.48B | $2.46B | $3.00B | 22.0% | 17.9% | 0.68% | 3.45% | 95.7% |
| 20 | InterBank | OK | High ROA; near-full funding | $5.45B | $3.87B | $4.69B | 21.2% | 21.7% | 3.60% | 0.56% | 97.4% |
| 21 | Banco do Brasil Americas | FL | Foreign-owned U.S. bank | $3.21B | $1.62B | $1.96B | 21.2% | 12.5% | 1.63% | 0.77% | 69.1% |
| 22 | The Camden National Bank | ME | Traditional; balanced | $6.97B | $4.09B | $4.93B | 20.6% | 19.4% | 1.03% | 0.14% | 88.5% |
| 23 | Equity Bank | KS | Traditional; balanced | $6.33B | $3.46B | $4.15B | 19.9% | 15.6% | 0.55% | 1.04% | 80.0% |
| 24 | BankFirst Financial Services | MS | Traditional; balanced | $3.26B | $1.83B | $2.18B | 18.9% | 18.9% | 1.04% | 0.68% | 77.6% |
| 25 | Principal Bank | IA | Low L/D; parent-related profile | $9.33B | $2.40B | $2.85B | 18.4% | 5.4% | 1.24% | 0.47% | 32.4% |
| 26 | SMBC MANUBANK | CA | Profitability watch | $7.68B | $3.91B | $4.61B | 18.0% | 30.0% | -2.43% | 0.40% | 70.2% |
| 27 | Bravera Bank | ND | Traditional; balanced | $3.83B | $2.30B | $2.71B | 18.0% | 11.4% | 1.12% | 0.92% | 80.7% |
| 28 | Bradesco Bank | FL | Foreign-owned; deposits lag | $5.47B | $3.67B | $4.32B | 17.8% | -2.4% | 0.94% | 0.21% | 94.0% |
| 29 | Sunwest Bank | UT | L/D watch | $4.09B | $2.79B | $3.28B | 17.4% | 11.7% | 1.93% | 0.58% | 103.2% |
| 30 | Banesco USA | FL | Foreign-owned; deposits ahead | $5.48B | $3.28B | $3.84B | 17.1% | 26.6% | 1.13% | 0.56% | 83.7% |
| 31 | Wheaton Bank & Trust, National Association | IL | Affiliate; deposits ahead | $4.48B | $2.61B | $3.04B | 16.4% | 23.8% | 1.46% | 0.47% | 79.2% |
| 32 | Bessemer Trust Company, National Association | NY | Private bank; low L/D | $6.42B | $0.80B | $0.93B | 16.1% | 88.7% | 2.96% | — | 16.9% |
| 33 | Five Star Bank | CA | Low NPL; near-full funding | $4.75B | $3.50B | $4.03B | 15.2% | 18.0% | 1.52% | 0.08% | 95.7% |
| 34 | Texas Regional Bank | TX | Deposits lag | $2.94B | $1.45B | $1.67B | 15.1% | 6.5% | 0.54% | 0.16% | 64.1% |
| 35 | St. Charles Bank & Trust Company, National Association | IL | Affiliate; balanced | $3.45B | $2.27B | $2.61B | 15.0% | 20.4% | 1.41% | 0.72% | 89.3% |
| 36 | Vantage Bank Texas | TX | Deposits lag | $4.94B | $3.26B | $3.75B | 14.8% | 7.9% | 1.53% | 0.77% | 84.1% |
| 37 | Bar Harbor Bank & Trust | ME | Traditional; balanced | $4.68B | $3.12B | $3.58B | 14.7% | 17.1% | 1.03% | 0.32% | 93.3% |
| 38 | The Bancorp Bank, National Association | SD | Payments/specialty | $9.35B | $6.29B | $7.19B | 14.3% | 5.4% | 2.81% | 1.32% | 87.9% |
| 39 | Habib American Bank | NY | Foreign/private-bank tilt | $2.74B | $1.60B | $1.83B | 14.3% | 13.0% | 0.82% | 1.14% | 77.9% |
| 40 | Liberty Bank | CT | Near-full L/D | $8.98B | $6.05B | $6.90B | 14.0% | 6.7% | 0.99% | 0.41% | 99.3% |
| 41 | First Dakota National Bank | SD | Traditional; balanced | $3.24B | $2.39B | $2.72B | 13.6% | 8.2% | 1.38% | 0.37% | 95.5% |
| 42 | Peapack Private Bank & Trust | NJ | Private-bank tilt | $7.52B | $5.45B | $6.19B | 13.6% | 7.4% | 0.57% | 1.10% | 93.7% |
| 43 | Ponce Bank, National Association | NY | High L/D watch | $3.21B | $2.30B | $2.60B | 13.3% | 8.0% | 1.01% | 1.03% | 126.2% |
| 44 | Cedar Rapids Bank and Trust Company | IA | High ROA; near-full L/D | $2.87B | $1.74B | $1.96B | 13.0% | 5.4% | 2.83% | 0.54% | 98.9% |
| 45 | WEX Bank | UT | Card/fleet specialty | $8.45B | $2.63B | $2.96B | 12.6% | 17.9% | 4.62% | 0.77% | 47.2% |
| 46 | Unity Bank | NJ | High L/D watch | $2.96B | $2.23B | $2.51B | 12.5% | 10.7% | 1.88% | 1.19% | 108.1% |
| 47 | Metropolitan Commercial Bank | NY | Commercial/specialty; deposits ahead | $8.25B | $5.97B | $6.71B | 12.4% | 23.6% | 0.97% | 1.29% | 90.3% |
| 48 | Libertyville Bank & Trust Company, National Association | IL | Affiliate; balanced | $3.14B | $2.12B | $2.38B | 12.2% | 17.0% | 1.65% | 0.50% | 89.7% |
| 49 | Hinsdale Bank & Trust Company, National Association | IL | Affiliate; balanced | $6.12B | $4.04B | $4.52B | 11.8% | 12.0% | 1.53% | 0.15% | 92.6% |
| 50 | SmartBank | TN | Traditional; balanced | $5.85B | $3.87B | $4.33B | 11.8% | 10.1% | 1.00% | 0.22% | 83.9% |
Can This Growth Rate Persist?
Retrospective rankings show who grew. The forward-looking question is who can keep growing without forcing the funding side of the balance sheet. For the top 50, the rough math is useful.
The cohort averaged about 24% year-over-year loan-book growth on a combined loan book of roughly $180 billion. If that pace repeated through 2026, the group would add approximately $43 billion in loans. At the cohort’s weighted L/D ratio of 83.1%, supporting that growth on balance sheet would require roughly $52 billion of additional deposits. Current deposit growth, applied to the existing deposit base, would generate roughly $43 billion. That leaves an implied cohort-level funding gap of about $9 billion.
That is not a crisis forecast. Spread across 50 institutions, the gap is manageable and many banks would address it through slower loan production, higher deposit pricing, wholesale funding, loan sales, or capital planning. But it is a useful monitoring threshold. Banks below 85% L/D with deposit growth near loan growth have room. Banks already above 100% L/D, with deposit growth decelerating while loans keep expanding, have less room for error.
For 2026 monitoring, the highest-signal follow-up metrics are: quarterly deposit growth, L/D ratio, brokered and wholesale funding mix, net interest margin pressure, NPL migration, net charge-offs, and whether growth persists after acquisition effects roll off.
Methodology
This ranking was built in Banking Intelligence from U.S. Call Report data for 2025-12-31 and 2024-12-31. The source basis is the Call Report framework distributed through the FFIEC Central Data Repository.[1]
We screened for active U.S. institutions with FDIC-sourced records, U.S. country codes, charter classes of STATE or OCC, and total assets below $10 billion as of 2025-12-31. We also required at least $100 million in loans at 2024-12-31 to reduce small-denominator distortions. Banks needed comparable loan data on both dates.
For this article, loan book means reported total loans and leases in the Banking Intelligence financial dataset. Balance-sheet values are stored in thousands of dollars and presented here in billions for readability. Growth rates, weighted mix comparisons, average ratios, the top-50 cohort statistics, the Growth Read labels, and the forward-looking funding math are Deep Digital Ventures calculations.
The biggest methodological caveat is classification. This is an under-$10B ranking, not a formal FDIC community-bank classification. That is why the article labels acquisition, specialty, private-bank, foreign-owned, and affiliate profiles instead of presenting the entire table as one homogeneous community-bank peer group.
Why This Ranking Matters
Loan-book growth is one of the cleanest signals of where banks are taking share, where demand exists, and where management teams are willing to put balance sheet to work. It is also easy to misread. A fast-growing acquisition integrator, a card bank, a private bank, a foreign-owned U.S. bank, and a local CRE/C&I lender can all rank near each other while telling completely different stories.
The practical use of the ranking is to identify names worth deeper work. Start with growth, then sort by funding support, acquisition provenance, loan mix, NPLs, ROA, efficiency, and L/D. The strongest banks are not necessarily the fastest banks. They are the banks where loan growth is fundable, profitable, and repeatable.
Build your own version: Banking Intelligence users can screen the Banks universe, save comparable cohorts in Peer Groups, pull data through Export, and turn promising names into coverage lists in Prospects.
FAQ
What counts as a community bank in this ranking?
This article uses an under-$10B active U.S. bank screen, not the FDIC’s formal community-bank classification. That means traditional community banks are included, but so are specialty, private-bank, foreign-owned, affiliate, and acquisition-affected institutions that meet the asset screen.
Why compare 2025-12-31 with 2024-12-31?
Matching year-end Call Report dates gives a clean full-year comparison and reduces seasonal noise. The ranking measures year-over-year loan-book growth across the same reporting basis.
Why require a $100 million starting loan book?
Without a starting-size threshold, very small banks can rank high because of small absolute-dollar changes. Requiring at least $100 million in loans at 2024-12-31 keeps the list focused on institutions with meaningful lending scale.
Does rapid loan-book growth mean a bank is outperforming?
Not by itself. Loan growth should be read with deposit growth, L/D ratio, ROA, efficiency, credit quality, capital, loan mix, and M&A context. Acquisition-led and specialty growth can be attractive, but they answer different strategic questions than organic community-bank growth.
Which rows are closest to a traditional community-bank growth story?
Rows with positive deposit growth, L/D below or near 100%, positive ROA, manageable NPLs, and no obvious acquisition caveat are the cleanest starting point. Old Second, Colony, Citizens & Northern, Camden National, BankFirst, Bravera, Bar Harbor, and SmartBank are examples worth reviewing through that lens.
Sources
Calculation note: Ranking statistics, loan-book growth rates, deposit growth rates, weighted loan-mix comparisons, L/D ratios, and the funding-gap math are Deep Digital Ventures calculations from Banking Intelligence Call Report fields.
- FFIEC Central Data Repository – public Call Report source for Reports of Condition and Income.
- FDIC Quarterly Banking Profile, Q4 2025 – industry and community-bank performance, loan growth, deposit growth, and asset-quality context.
- OCC Bulletin 2006-46, Interagency CRE Concentration Guidance – supervisory criteria and risk-management framework for CRE concentrations.
- FDIC Community Banking Studies – formal FDIC research context for community-bank classification and analysis.
- ChoiceOne Q4 2025 results – Fentura merger timing and acquired loans/deposits.
- Wintrust and Macatawa merger completion announcement – Macatawa acquisition context and balances at closing.
- German American Q1 2025 earnings release – Heartland acquisition impact and organic-loan-growth disclosure.
- CNB Financial Q4 and full-year 2025 results – ESSA acquisition impact, acquired loans/deposits, and organic growth disclosure.