First Security Bank Stays On Top of ROA Rankings

First Security Bank of Searcy has the best return on assets (ROA) of any bank doing business in Northwest Arkansas, according to an annual list compiled by the Northwest Arkansas Business Journal.

The Business Journal annually compiles a list of all banks doing business in its coverage area (Benton, Carroll, Crawford, Madison, Sebastian and Washington) in terms of which bank has the best ROA. To see the list, click here. For a list of public banks with operations in Northwest Arkansas ranked by ROA, click here.

First Security, which has 18 local branch locations, ended 2015 with an ROA of 2.28 percent, edging out the No. 2 bank Armstrong Bank of Muskogee, Oklahoma, which had an ROA of 2.22 percent.

First Security has topped the Business Journal’s annual list for six straight years.

Armstrong Bank entered the Fort Smith market in the first quarter of 2015 when it acquired 100 percent of the stock of Benefit Bank. Armstrong also has an office on the west side of Springdale just off U.S. Highway 412.

A bank’s ROA is a popular metric used to determine its profitability. As defined by the Federal Deposit Insurance Corp., it shows the percentage of how profitable a company’s assets are in generating revenue. The higher the ROA, the more money the company is earning on its assets.

According to the FDIC, Arkansas-chartered banks had a collective ROA of 1.26 percent at the end of 2015. Six of the 29 private banks on the list were above that mark.