Bank doesn't blink at crisis.

• Position: Eastern

Forget the fractured proverb--if you can keep your head when all around you are losing theirs, you don't know the gravity of the situation. Eric Bergevin knows banking's situation is grave, but he believes that makes it a good time to start a bank unencumbered with bad loans, ruptured mortgages and gummy liquidity. Five months into it, in the midst of the worst financial crisis since the Depression, his proposed Albemarle Bank & Trust was more than 60% of the way to raising its minimum goal of $13.2 million.

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"Now's a perfect time for a de novo bank to open," says the Winston-Salem native, who will become its president and CEO. "We've got a clean slate, new capital to lend, and customers with institutions that don't have capital or the liquidity to lend are looking for other options." Albemarle Bank has opened loan-production offices in Edenton, its home base, and Greenville. Startups may under certain circumstances make loans, though not engage in retail transactions. Bergevin wants to open a branch a year for the first three years.

Albemarle Bank is being founded at a time when startups are slowing. A spokeswoman for the state banking commissioner says it's one of four proposed this year. One, Legacy Bank of Charlotte, gave up in October after raising $17 million of its $26.6 million goal. The record is nine, in 1997, 2000 and 2006. Only one opened in 2002, after 2001 's terrorist attacks shook the nation. Three opened last year.

Albemarle Bank will serve retail and commercial customers and expects to thrive in two distinct Eastern North...