Limestone Bancorp, Inc. (LMST)

Limestone Bancorp, Inc. was the holding company for Limestone Bank, a Kentucky community bank based in Louisville. The bank offered commercial, real estate and consumer loans, deposit accounts and treasury services to businesses and individuals through about 20 branches across Kentucky. It focused on commercial and real estate lending to small and mid-sized businesses, and its market area included Louisville, Lexington and many smaller communities in central and western Kentucky. Most of its funding came from local deposits.

The company was long known as Porter Bancorp, whose stock traded on Nasdaq. Porter suffered heavy losses on real estate loans after the 2008 financial crisis and operated under regulatory agreements for several years while it rebuilt capital. After returning to steady profits, it renamed itself Limestone Bancorp in 2018 and its ticker changed to LMST.

By March 2023 Limestone had about $1.5 billion in assets, $1.1 billion in loans and $1.2 billion in deposits. In 2022 Peoples Bancorp of Marietta, Ohio agreed to acquire the company in an all-stock deal that gave Limestone shareholders 0.90 shares of Peoples common stock for each share held. The combination made Peoples one of the larger community banking companies in the Ohio Valley and gave it a stronger presence in Kentucky.

The acquisition took effect at the close of business on April 30, 2023, and Limestone's stock was removed from Nasdaq. Limestone Bank briefly operated as a division of Peoples Bank before its branches were converted to the Peoples Bank name in August 2023. Peoples Bancorp trades on Nasdaq under the ticker PEBO.