Henry A. “Rusty” Barham III has been named executive vice president for regulatory and consumer affairs and assistant general counsel for Simmons Bank. Barham has been employed in the banking industry for 28 years and has been a member of the Louisiana State Bar Association for 34 years. He most recently served as executive vice president and general counsel for Origin Bancorp Inc. of Ruston, La.
“With our recent acquisition announcements, we’ll be moving into new states,” said George A. Makris Jr., chairman and chief executive officer of Simmons First National Corp. “We will move over the $10 billion mark with significant new regulatory requirements. Rusty is known as a problem solver who has a strong, positive reputation with regulators. He is well prepared to help us navigate our growth. We feel fortunate to have him join us.”
Barham received his bachelor’s degree from Louisiana State University at Baton Rouge and his law degree from the Paul M. Hebert Law Center at LSU. After serving as a law clerk for the U.S. Bankruptcy Court for the Western District of Louisiana, Barham worked as an associate for a law firm in Baton Rouge and later served as assistant attorney general in the Civil Section of the Louisiana Department of Justice. He entered the banking industry in 1989 as a staff attorney with Baton Rouge Bank & Trust Co. and later become the bank’s general counsel. In 1994, Barham joined Whitney National Bank of New Orleans, which had operations in five states, and served as an executive at the bank for 17 years.
Barham joined Hancock Bank as a senior vice president after Hancock acquired Whitney. He moved to Associated Banc-Corp of Green Bay, Wis., in March 2012 and was responsible for a staff of 50 people involved in compliance efforts. Associated Banc is a $29 billion asset institution and is one of the top 50 publicly traded U.S. bank holding companies. Barham returned to Louisiana in 2014 to join Origin, a $4 billion bank holding company.
About Simmons Bank
Simmons Bank (Member FDIC) is an Arkansas state-chartered bank that started as a community bank in 1903. Through the decades, Simmons has developed a full suite of financial products and services designed to meet the needs of individual consumers and business customers alike. Simmons has grown steadily to approximately $8.4 billion in assets, with nearly 180 branch and ATM locations throughout Arkansas, Kansas, Missouri and Tennessee. It is the subsidiary bank for Simmons First National Corporation (NASDAQ: SFNC), a publicly traded bank holding company headquartered in Pine Bluff, Arkansas. For more information, visit www.simmonsbank.com.
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For more information CONTACT:
Rex Nelson
Director of Corporate Community Relations
Simmons Bank
rex.nelson@simmonsbank.com
(501) 377-7606