Both headquarters were in the Las Vegas Valley. Both reported $1.1 billion in deposits June 30, 2007, according to In Business research.

But there were some differences, too.

Of course, the most obvious difference is that Community Bank is open for business. Silver State was closed by the state's Financial Institutions Division last month.

In Silver State's second-quarter filing to the Securities and Exchange Commission on June 30, it reported its nonperforming loans - those overdue by 90 days or more - increased to $252 million from the $78 million reported in its first-quarter report March 31. Those loans represented 16.23 percent of the bank's loans.

Community Bank's second-quarter filing reported $69.3 million in bad loans, or 4.6 percent of its loans.

Silver State, in that same quarter's filing, reported a net loss of $62.7 million.

Community Bank's net loss was reported at $4.6 million. It reported in the first quarter a gain of $2.7 million.

I sat down Oct. 1 with Ed Jamison, chief executive of Community Bancorp., and Larry Scott, chief executive of subsidiary Community Bank of Nevada, at Community Bank's headquarters in downtown Las Vegas to discuss their business and the economy's effect on the bank.

"I think it's had heightening questions for our customers about deposits," Jamison said. "We've had a shift in the types of accounts they have."

Some customers have pulled their deposits from the bank, but at the same time, Scott said, "very, very few customers ... have closed their accounts.

"We have been both impacted and been a beneficiary of the circumstances," he said. "We've had large depositors who have kept their money with us, but spread money around to other institutions. Conversely, in the past several months, we've opened more accounts than we've ever opened as a result of more people doing the same thing: diversifying. And we get a $100,000 here and a $100,000 there."

The bank didn't lose the accounts, he said.

"We lost some of the money (that is) now maybe spread a little different from it was before," he said. "And that's good for us. That's positive. But we'll be back stronger than before. I'm not saying that we're weak in any respect, but I think banks will become stronger and learn from this (credit crisis) experience."

Jamison is optimistic the bank will turn itself around, but "it's going to be a while."

"I think we're going to end the year pretty good, we're going to start '09 in a lot better shape ... This isn't going to be something that recovers (in) two quarters, three quarters. This is going to be, I don't want to say recover, (but) back to the levels to where you were.

"I think every bank is sitting back and saying, 'All right, this is where you were going in, when you come out, are you going to be a different bank?' " Jamison said. "Yes, we are."

Part of the bank's strategy is to hire on people with different view points and approaches, Jamison said. That will help in the long term, he said.

"If you don't learn from the things that happened, you're bound to repeat," he said. "So, we're looking to see what we did. I think we did a lot of things right. I've met with our lenders, and if we found one lender that was doing something wrong, we would have taken some action. A lot of this is caused by influences beyond their control: the market."

So, what about the third-quarter report?

Jamison said that although the quarter ended Sept. 30, he couldn't elaborate on it until it was released.

He did say, though, that Community Bancorp. will have a slight improvement over the second quarter.

"We lost money (in the second quarter) and that was the first time that we ever lost money," he said. "It was a historic event for us. The pressure on the interest margin is great, and also many of the problem credits that (are not paying) are taking away income, so there's pressure there."

When asked if that situation has improved, he said, "probably not."

But, he countered, "We're out looking for business, and that's the point. We've got people out knocking on doors everyday ... If we're not, we've got a problem. But we don't. We're aggressively looking for business."

Until the end of 2009, the Federal Deposit Insurance Corp. will insure deposits up to $250,000 from the previous limit of $100,000.

Accounts that are insured to the temporary limit are joint and individual accounts, individual and certain retirement accounts and trust accounts.

For more information, visit myFDICinsurance.gov, call (877) 275-3342 or ask your bank.

The increase was part of the Emergency Economic Stabilization Act signed Oct. 3 by President Bush.