Umpqua Holdings Expands Stock Offer; Shares Fall

PORTLAND, Ore. (AP) — Shares of Umpqua Holdings Corp. fell on Friday after the regional bank increased the size of a common stock offering, and priced the offer at a nearly 9 percent discount to the stock's Thursday closing price.

Four days after announcing plans for an offering of $175 million, Umpqua said Friday that it was increasing the size to $225 million. Umpqua, whose stock closed Thursday at $10.69, priced the offering at $9.75 per share, for a total of about 23.1 million shares of common stock.

On Friday, shares of Portland-based Umpqua fell 50 cents, or nearly 4.7 percent, to $10.19 in midday trading. The stock had fallen as low as $9.98 earlier in Friday's session.

Under the revised offering announced Friday, Umpqua is granting the underwriters a 30-day option to buy up to about 3.5 million shares to cover overallotments, if any.

The offering is expected to close on Aug. 19.

The company, which is the parent organization for Umpqua Bank and Umpqua Investments Inc., said the net proceeds from the offering will be used for general corporate purposes. That could include growth and acquisition opportunities and positioning the company to redeem preferred stock issued to the U.S. Treasury under the troubled-asset relief program capital purchase program.