The combination will allow Fifth Third to provide financial institutions and merchants a powerhouse of comprehensive and flexible payment processing services including EFT processing, network transaction processing and full service customer support and processing for credit and debit card portfolios.

CMC, headquartered in Evansville, IN, is a leading provider of services to financial institutions and retailers for credit card, debit card, merchant and private label programs. They operate a second multi-lingual contact center in Tucson, Arizona. This merger creates a powerhouse of two industry-leading companies and provides a unique combination in its abilities to offer a full- service suite of payment solutions to customers of both organizations. CMC will continue to operate under their name and operations are planned to be maintained in existing CMC facilities.

"Our partnership with Fifth Third Processing Solutions enhances our ability to serve our clients through expanded product offerings and provides the resources necessary to continue to provide industry leading technologies," said Mike Reffett, president and CEO of CMC.

"CMC has created an excellent servicing environment," commented Charles Drucker, president, Fifth Third Processing Solutions. "This investment gives us an opportunity to partner with a rapidly growing and innovative enterprise and provide more robust products and services to partners of both companies. Our partnership with CMC is perfectly aligned with our growth strategy." Drucker added, "Credit card processing is a natural extension of the processing services we provide to financial institution companies and merchants."

Terms of the transaction were not disclosed. The purchase is not expected to have a material impact on the financial results of Fifth Third Bancorp.