E6-6181. Formations of, Acquisitions by, and Mergers of Bank Holding Companies

The companies listed in this notice have applied to the Board for approval, pursuant to the Bank Holding Company Act of 1956 (12 U.S.C. 1841 et seq.) (BHC Act), Regulation Y (12 CFR part 225), and all other applicable statutes and regulations to become a bank holding company and/or to acquire the assets or the ownership of, control of, or the power to vote shares of a bank or bank holding company and all of the banks and nonbanking companies owned by the bank holding company, including the companies listed below.

The applications listed below, as well as other related filings required by the Board, are available for immediate inspection at the Federal Reserve Bank indicated. The application also will be available for inspection at the offices of the Board of Governors. Interested persons may express their views in writing on the standards enumerated in the BHC Act (12 U.S.C. 1842(c)). If the proposal also involves the acquisition of a nonbanking company, the review also includes whether the acquisition of the nonbanking company complies with the standards in section 4 of the BHC Act (12 U.S.C. 1843). Unless otherwise noted, nonbanking activities will be conducted throughout the United States. Additional information on all bank holding companies may be obtained from the National Information Center Web site at http://www.ffiec.gov/​nic/​.

Unless otherwise noted, comments regarding each of these applications must be received at the Reserve Bank indicated or the offices of the Board of Governors not later than May 19, 2006.

A. Federal Reserve Bank of New York (Anne McEwen, Financial Specialist) 33 Liberty Street, New York, New York 10045-0001:

1. HSBC Holdings plc and HSBC Overseas Holdings (UK) Limited, both of London, United Kingdom, and their direct and indirect subsidiaries, HSBC North America Holdings, Inc., HSBC Investments (North America), Inc., HSBC North America Inc., all of Wilmington, Delaware, and HSBC USA Inc., Baltimore, Maryland, to convert their limited purpose and non-depository trust bank subsidiary, HSBC Trust Company (Delaware), N.A., Wilmington, Delaware, into a full service bank.

B. Federal Reserve Bank of Chicago (Patrick M. Wilder, Assistant Vice President) 230 South LaSalle Street, Chicago, Illinois 60690-1414:

1. Alpha Bancorp, Inc., and Metropolitan Bank Group, Inc., both of Chicago, Illinois; to acquire 100 percent of the voting shares of Community Bank of DuPage, Westmont, Illinois (in organization).

C. Federal Reserve Bank of Kansas City (Donna J. Ward, Assistant Vice President) 925 Grand Avenue, Kansas City, Missouri 64198-0001:

1. First Fidelity Bancorp, Inc., Oklahoma City, Oklahoma; to acquire 100 percent of the voting shares of Apex Mortgage Company, and thereby indirectly acquire Edmond Bank and Trust, both of Edmond, Oklahoma.

Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve System, April 20, 2006.

Jennifer J. Johnson,

Secretary of the Board.