The Carson Medlin Company serves a variety of financial services clients, focusing on the nation's high growth markets. The firm typically works directly with the senior management, directors and shareholders of client institutions. Today the firm's clients include a diversity of financial services providers, including:

• - Commercial Banks & Thrifts
• - Registered Investment Advisors (RIAs)
• - Insurance Agencies
• - Mortgage Banking Concerns
• - Specialty Finance Companies
• - Trust Companies

The Financial Services Industry

Over the last three decades, the banking industry has experienced substantial consolidation, and some of the most venerated names in the business have disappeared. Carson Medlin has been part of this consolidation movement, participating in well over 100 successful mergers; in roughly one third of those transactions, the firm represented buying institutions as they built their franchises.

At the same time that the banking industry has consolidated, significant amounts of new capital have returned to the banking market to capitalize new "de novo" institutions. A number of these new banks have started with capitalizations that are extraordinarily high by historical standards, and they often "go public," enter nontraditional lines of business, and do their own acquiring very quickly. The firm has advised a number of this new generation of banks on strategic issues and specific transactions.

The institutions, both old and new, that have survived to comprise today's banking industry face a brave new world that is fiercely competitive. Competition comes from many directions-- other banks, credit unions, brokerage firms, and many other sources willing and able to deliver financial products at razor thin margins, many using highly efficient, low cost means of delivery such as the internet. Increasingly, survivors in the banking industry recognize the need to diversify into complementary financial service businesses to add new sources of revenue and remain competitive. In response to these conditions, Carson Medlin has added experience and expertise in nontradtional businesses in order to serve the growing needs of our clients.