AgFirst Bank Picks ALLTEL's ACBS for Capital Market Lending; Premier Agricultural Lender Intends to Grow Revenues, Not Operating Costs.

Business Editors/Technology Writers

LITTLE ROCK, Ark.--(BUSINESS WIRE)--Feb. 20, 2002

AgFirst Farm Credit Bank will use ALLTEL's (NYSE:AT) Advanced Commercial Banking System (ACBS) to help the bank control costs while it grows revenues. The bank's capital markets unit will use ACBS to originate, sell and service its fast-growing portfolio of syndicated and participated commercial loans, many of which are originated by the 24 Farm Credit-affiliated owners of AgFirst.

ALLTEL will implement its Deal & Loan Origination, Primary Sales and Syndication, and Deal & Loan Servicing-Extended products for AgFirst over the next six months. The ACBS system is scheduled to be in operation for AgFirst by the third quarter of this year.

"We have experienced record growth in capital markets lending during the past two years, with significant increases in both profitability and market share," said Larry Doyle, executive vice president with responsibility for lending operations at AgFirst. "Our challenge now is to continue this strong growth while containing transaction costs. An extensive review of the major commercial lending systems convinced us that ACBS offers the best set of tools for the job."

Capital markets lenders offer customized credit facilities to meet the unique needs of large business. AgFirst, as part of the Farm Credit System, offers a broad range of services to the agricultural industry.

"ACBS allows these lenders to readily adapt our solutions to the products and business practices that characterize their unique sector of the financial services industry," said Richard Levy, president of ALLTEL's ACBS organization. "Our goal is to enable AgFirst Bank to improve productivity and increase responsiveness to customers while realizing continuing profit growth."

Levy noted that AgFirst is the second Farm Credit Bank to implement ACBS. Denver-based CoBank has been using ACBS for commercial lending support since 1997.

Headquartered in Columbia, S.C., and reporting total assets of approximately $13 billion, AgFirst is part of the nationwide Farm Credit System, the largest agricultural lending organization in the United States. The bank provides funding and financial services to 24 Farm Credit-affiliated owners of AgFirst.

ALLTEL's ACBS is an integrated family of commercial lending products that automates the entire range of commercial lending activity, from deal origination through settlement and accounting to risk management and loan trading. The products operate in real-time, in any currency and in multiple languages. ACBS products run on AS/400 and Windows NT platforms and are licensed by 36 leading financial institutions, including ABN AMRO, Bank of America, Canadian Imperial Bank of Commerce, Credit Agricole/Indosuez - U.S., Credit Lyonnais, JPMorgan Chase and State Street.

Forty-seven of the top 50 U.S. banks rely on ALLTEL's products and services. ALLTEL provides loan servicing automation for more than 20 million mortgage loans, with balances exceeding $2 trillion. Additionally, more than 34 percent of the total dollar volume of outstanding U.S. consumer loans, including mortgages, is processed on ALLTEL Information Services' software applications.

ALLTEL, with more than 10 million communications customers and $7.6 billion in annual revenues, is a leader in the communications and information services industries. ALLTEL has communications customers in 24 states and provides information services to telecommunications, financial and mortgage clients in more than 50 countries.

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