Regulators seize three more banks in U.S.

WASHINGTON Jan 15 (Reuters) - Regulators closed three U.S. banks on Friday, as deteriorating loans continue to claim community and regional banks reeling from the financial crisis.

The Federal Deposit Insurance Corp said that Town Community Bank and Trust of Antioch, Illinois, and St. Stephen State Bank of St. Stephen, Minnesota, had failed. Other banks agreed to assume the deposits at those failed institutions.

Barnes Banking Co of Kaysville, Utah, was also seized, and the FDIC created a bridge bank to protect depositors as they move their accounts to other institutions.

The agency did not give the causes of their collapses. The FDIC has said that the pace of bank failures will remain elevated this year because of extensive loan losses tied to home mortgages and commercial real estate.

Barnes Banking Co had about $828 million in total assets.

Town Community Bank had about $70 million in assets, and St. Stephen State Bank had about $25 million.

The failures will likely cost the FDIC's insurance fund about $296.3 million, the agency said.

So far this year, four banks have failed, and 140 banks were closed in 2009. Last year marked the highest annual level of failures since 1992 during the savings and loan crisis.

The failures have drained the insurance fund used to safeguard bank deposits, but the FDIC has plenty of access to funding through $45 billion in prepaid industry assessments. It also has the ability to tap a $500 billion line of credit with the Treasury Department.

The FDIC insures accounts up to $250,000. (Reporting by Karey Wutkowski; editing by Carol Bishopric)