Chap. 96.—An ACT to amend and reenact Section 13, as amended, of Chapter
SO of the ees oe Assecably of 1928, a pproved March 27, 1928 and known
as the Virginia Banking Rees relating to the establishment and operation
of branch banks. [H 20]

Approved March 4, 1948

Be it enacted by the General Assembly of Virginia:

1. That section thirteen, as amended, of chapter five hundred
seven of the Acts of Assembly of nineteen hundred twenty-eight,
approved March twenty-seven, nineteen hundred twenty-eight,
and known as the Virginia Banking Act, be amended and reenacted
as follows:

Section 13. When branch banks may be authorized; branches
already established or authorized; how operated; penalties.—(a)
No bank or trust company heretofore or hereafter incorporated
under the laws of this State shall be authorized to engage in busi-
ness in more than one place, except that the State Corporation
Commission, when satisfied that public convenience and necessity
will thereby be served, may authorize banks having paid-up and
unimpaired capital and surplus of fifty thousand dollars or over to
establish branches within the limits of the city, town or village in
which the parent bank is located.

(b) This section shall not be construed to prohibit the merger
of banks in the same or adjoining counties or of banks located with-
in a distance of twenty-five miles of a parent bank and the operation
by the merged company, of such banks, nor to prohibit the sale of
any bank to, and the purchase thereof by, any other bank in the
same or adjoining counties or within a distance of twenty-five miles
and the operation of such banks by the purchasing bank, provided
that the State Corporation Commission shall be of opinion and
shall first determine that public convenience and necessity will be
served by such operation, and provided, further, that at the time
of such merger or purchase, each of the banks involved shall have
been in actual operation for a period of five years or more; except
that in any case in which the State Corporation Commission is
satisfied that the public interest demands, on account of emergency
conditions, that a merger or sale be effected, it may enter an order
to such effect permitting such merger or sale, notwithstanding that
the banks involved, or one or more of them, have not been in actual
operation for five or more years. The term “adjoining counties”
where more than two are involved, shall be construed to mean
counties each of which shall adjoin the county in which the parent
bank is located.

(c) This section, however, shall not apply to branch banks
already established nor to branches heretofore authorized by the
State Corporation Commission but not yet opened.

(d) No branch bank heretofore or hereafter established shall
be operated or advertised under any other name than that of
the identical name of the home bank, unless permission be first
had and obtained from the State Corporation Commission, and
unless such different name shall contain or have added thereto
language clearly indicating that it is a branch bank and of which
bank it is a branch.
Any bank or trust company violating the provisions of this
section shall be liable to a fine of one thousand dollars, to be
imposed and judgment entered therefor by the State Corporation
Commission, and enforced by its process.