Why Columbia Financial Stock Rocked the Market Today
Key Points
The bank is adding scale with its latest acquisition.
It has agreed to buy peer Northfield Bancorp.
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Monday was quite the eventful day for bank holding company Columbia Financial (NASDAQ: CLBK). It published its latest set of fundamentals and announced the acquisition of a peer. Investors clearly considered both developments to be positive, as they traded Columbia's stock up by nearly 9% that trading session.
A memorable Monday
The first of those two was the acquisition announcement. Columbia divulged that it has agreed to acquire peer Northfield Bancorp. The deal is valued at roughly $597 million and, according to the buyer, it will create the third-largest regional bank headquartered in New Jersey. All told, the combined company will have $18 billion in assets.
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Shortly after that news was made public, Columbia unveiled its final set of results for 2025. For the fourth quarter, the company's total revenue more than tripled from the same period of 2024 to almost $69 million, although that large gain was affected by a relatively steep loss on securities transactions in the year-ago quarter.
Meanwhile, net income in accordance with generally accepted accounting principles (GAAP) landed at just under $15.7 million, or $0.15 per share, contrasting sharply with the more than $21 million loss in the fourth quarter of 2024.
In its earnings release, Columbia quoted CEO Thomas Kemly as saying that the improvements "reflect our strategies of focusing on margin expansion, improving our asset mix by continuing to expand commercial lending, efficiency improvement through technology and investing in the infrastructure required for sustainable growth."
A development to watch closely
The acquisition of a peer always makes a company's future a bit unpredictable. However, Columbia's purchase of Northfield feels like a sensible move to dramatically increase the regional lender's scale. All investor eyes will be on how Columbia fuses Northfield's operations; so far, the two seem well matched, but as ever in situations like this, it'll depend on how effectively the buyer manages the process.
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Eric Volkman has no position in any of the stocks mentioned. The Motley Fool has no position in any of the stocks mentioned. The Motley Fool has a disclosure policy.
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