State’s Two Largest Rural Lending Co-ops Merge

BRYAN, Texas — Capital Farm Credit, ACA and First Ag Credit, FCS merged Oct. 1, forming the largest rural financing institution in Texas.

“This merger has been in the works since last year, because these two organizations were both highly successful cooperative lenders that shared the same values,” said Ben Novosad, Capital Farm Credit chief executive officer.

“While some of the recent mergers in the financial sector lately have been due to negative circumstances, ours was undertaken from a position of strength. It made sense to bring our diverse commodities and geographic territory together into one loan portfolio,” Novosad said.

The resulting organization, known as Capital Farm Credit, ACA, has combined assets of more than $5 billion, making it one of the largest lending organizations in the nationwide Farm Credit System.

“As a result of the merger, we now have more capacity to serve an even broader territory in the state.” Capital Farm Credit’s service territory now includes 194 Texas counties.

“As a cooperative, we are owned by our customers, and they stand to benefit when we grow stronger,” Novosad said. “We are proud to have maintained our high credit standards and still be doing well for our customers.”  

Novosad said the lending organization will also continue to share earnings with its customers through its patronage program. In recent years, Capital Farm Credit has distributed almost $200 million in combined cash patronage to its customers and has allocated additional equity available for future disbursement.