Finance, Banking & Insurance

Oakland, Md. – – September 24, 2026 -- First United Corporation (NASDAQ: FUNC) will pay a cash dividend of $0.28 per share on September 24, 2026, its Board of Directors confirmed.

Board approves quarterly payout tied to October record date

Shareholders of record as of the close of business on September 24, 2026, will be eligible to receive the $0.28-per-share distribution. First United Corporation is the parent of First United Bank & Trust, a Maryland-chartered trust company with commercial banking powers.

Grand Rapids, Mich. – September 24, 2026 -- Mercantile Bank is deploying $150,000 in matching grants to eight Michigan nonprofit organizations through the Federal Home Loan Bank of Indianapolis Community Multiplier Member Match Program, targeting affordable housing gaps statewide.

Mercantile Bank channels $150,000 through FHLBank Indianapolis matching program

The Community Multiplier program allows member financial institutions to support affordable housing nonprofits via matching grants. Mercantile's funding will back initiatives spanning housing stability, housing counseling and education, organizational capacity building, and affordable housing development and preservation.

NEW YORK – September 24, 2026 -- M&A litigation settlements in the Delaware Court of Chancery hit 25 in 2025, the highest count since 2012, yet aggregate settlement value collapsed to $326.6 million from an inflation-adjusted peak of $734.8 million in 2023, according to a Cornerstone Research report released today.

The median settlement fell to $10 million in 2025, the lowest figure recorded across the 14-year study period, which draws on a hand-collected sample of 143 settlements with known monetary amounts between 2012 and 2025.

West Chester, Pa. – September 24, 2026 -- Mole Street, an Elite HubSpot Solutions Partner, will exhibit at Booth 5 during the Digital Marketing for Financial Services Midwest Summit at the Hilton Chicago on September 22-23, presenting data from a new report co-authored with HubSpot based on a survey of 270 U.S. financial services leaders.

San Francisco – September 24, 2026 -- Juniper Square, which operates as the technology and fund administration partner for more than 2,300 private markets general partners (GPs) worldwide, has launched Capital Intelligence, a new CRM product that embeds Nasdaq eVestment Market Lens institutional data directly into GPs' existing investor relations workflows.

Product taps a database of 30,000+ institutional firms and 70,000+ mandates

Capital Intelligence is built on Nasdaq eVestment Market Lens, which covers more than 30,000 institutional firms, 70,000-plus mandates, and 100,000-plus investment professionals. The tool automatically refreshes investor and consultant records inside Juniper Square's CRM, combining structured relationship data with qualitative signals such as pacing plans, consultant sentiment, and allocation trends.

Manama – September 24, 2026 -- Mo Gawdat, former Chief Business Officer of Google X, has joined the speaker lineup for Fintech Forward 2026, set to take place 7-8 October 2026 at Exhibition World Bahrain under the theme 'Finance in the Age of Intelligent Infrastructure'.

Gawdat brings 27 years of tech leadership to the financial services debate

Gawdat's career spans IBM, NCR, Microsoft and Google, where he helped launch nearly half of Google's global operations before leading business at Google X, the lab behind self-driving cars, Project Loon and Makani. He is also founder of the One Billion Happy movement, host of the Slo Mo podcast, and author of bestsellers including Solve for Happy, Scary Smart and Unstressable.

Ho Chi Minh City – September 23, 2026 -- STARCARES, the corporate social responsibility programme of global multi-asset broker STARTRADER, delivered gift sets, household essentials and cash support to 213 people at SOS Children's Village Ho Chi Minh City in Go Vap during a Mid-Autumn Festival event called "A Full Moon for Every Child."

Aid reaches 60 children and 213 total beneficiaries at the Go Vap village

Every child at the village received a gift set containing a lantern, cookies, a water bottle, a milk pack and a colouring kit. Hygiene, cleaning and pantry supplies were distributed to village houses, alongside financial support for operating costs, reaching house mothers and staff among the 213 recipients.

Trenton – September 23, 2026 -- New Jersey Gov. Mikie Sherrill has signed bipartisan legislation (A5016/S4218) creating an Employee Ownership Transition Program and a revolving loan fund at the New Jersey Economic Development Authority (NJEDA) to finance conversions of businesses into employee-owned firms.

NJEDA revives a financing model that returned ninefold on its original loan

The new Employee Ownership Revolving Loan Fund reactivates a mechanism NJEDA first used 50 years ago to finance the employee buyout of the Okonite Company in Passaic County. That original loan was fully repaid and revolved nine times over; Okonite remains 100% employee-owned today and has distributed more than $300 million in ESOP payouts to workers. The fund can draw capital from state appropriations, federal sources including U.S. Economic Development Administration grants, and philanthropic capital.

New York – September 22, 2026 -- YELL, a payments platform serving consumers and small businesses, has appointed Raphael Blunschi as Chief Executive Officer as the company surpasses 27,000 customers as of September 2026.

Blunschi brings three decades of Swiss banking and asset management experience to YELL's leadership

Blunschi spent more than 30 years across Swiss banking, institutional asset management, and digital assets. He was a founding member of UBS's prime brokerage business and, at RMF/Man Group, built a multi-billion-dollar global managed account platform designed to make hedge fund exposures transparent and institutionally scalable. He then spent 13 years at K2 Advisors, a Franklin Templeton investment company, serving as Chief Administrative Officer, Executive Committee member, and fund board director for eight private funds.

Wilmington – September 22, 2026 -- U.S. Bank ranked first overall among 17 leading U.S. retail banks in Keynova Group's Q3 2026 Mobile Banker Scorecard, topping both mobile app and mobile web experience categories.

U.S. Bank and Bank of America lead the only banks offering native voice-enabled virtual assistants

Keynova found that only U.S. Bank's Smart Assistant and Bank of America's Erica currently support native in-app voice interactions for tasks including bill payment scheduling, transfers, card controls and credit score display. Erica additionally handles Zelle transaction display and P2P payment initiation via vocal commands. Across the broader panel, 35% of Scorecard banks now offer advanced text-based virtual assistants using natural language processing, though voice capability remains rare.