Bankand thrift stocks movedhigher in morning trading Friday, Sept. 23. Around midday, the SNLU.S. Bank Index was up 0.38% to 418.90 and the SNL U.S. Thrift Indexhad increased 0.34% to 836.96.

Thebroader markets headed south. The Dow Jones Industrial Average slid 0.37% to18,323.56, the S&P 500 decreased 0.35% to 2,169.66 and the Nasdaq compositeindex declined 0.31% to 5,322.83.

increased0.13% to $45.78 amid news that Chairman and CEO John Stumpf has from a Fed advisorycouncil and that a group of senators is calling for the Department of Labor to investigate WellsFargo & Co. in the wake of the bank's unauthorized account scandal.

, whichrecently announced a secondary underwritten public offering of 2,650,000 common shares by itschairman, saw its stock fall 3.88% to $21.79 in morning trading. The offeringwas priced to the public at $22.00 per share.

Thecompany also disclosed in a Form 8-K filed yesterday that on Sept. 9, itentered into a nonbinding letter of intent to acquire a Florida-based bankholding company having total assets of approximately $400 million for apurchase price of $88.5 million.

Inother banking news, Ontario, Calif.-based CVB Financial Corp. agreed to Visalia, Calif.-based in a cash-and-stockdeal. CVB Financial was unchanged at $17.56 around midday. Valley CommerceBancorp jumped 37.70% to $22.79 in morning trading.

advanced 1.31% to$20.15, following news that the company's unit, , has all its existing loss-shareagreements with the FDIC.

Inthe thrift space, New YorkCommunity Bancorp Inc. rose 2.50% to $14.78,Astoria Financial Corp.climbed 2.10% to $15.05 and BofIHolding Inc. increased 1.43% to $22.53. slipped 0.11% to $18.04.

Market prices and indexvalues are current as of the time of publication and are subject to change.