Georgia Banks Bounce Back

NEW YORK (TheStreet) -- Georgia banks saw significant improvements during the first quarter, with 81% institutions in the Peach Tree State showing profits, up from less than 60% in the fourth quarter.

The improvement was even stronger than the trend seen for Florida banks, although Georgia still leads all states with 28 undercapitalized institutions on TheStreet's first-quarter Bank Watch List, with Florida in second place, with 20 undercapitalized banks.

The largest Georgia bank to fail so far this year was The First State Bank of Stockbridge, which was shuttered by state regulators in January, and sold by the Federal Deposit Insurance Corp. to Hamilton State Bank of Hoschton, Ga.

Since the Watch List is based solely on capital ratios, we take a different approach on our quarterly coverage of banks in key states, by looking at overall credit quality to identify troubled institutions.

Georgia Banks with Weakest Asset Quality

The following list includes all banks in the state with nonperforming assets comprising more than 15% of total assets as of March 31, according to data supplied by Thomson Reuters Bank Insight:

Nonperforming assets (NPA) include nonaccrual loans, loans past due 90 days or more and repossessed assets. Government-guaranteed loan balances are excluded. The ratio of net charge-offs to average loans is annualized.