09:10 AM EDT, 04/29/2024 (MT Newswires) -- Financial stocks were advancing premarket Monday as the Financial Select Sector SPDR Fund ( XLF ) was 0.1% higher recently.

The Direxion Daily Financial Bull 3X Shares ( FAS ) was 0.3% higher and its bearish counterpart Direxion Daily Financial Bear 3X Shares ( FAZ ) was down 0.1%.

UMB Financial ( UMBF ) has agreed to acquire Heartland Financial (HTLF) in an all-stock transaction valued at about $2 billion, the banks said. Heartland Financial USA ( HTLF ) was over 16% higher pre-bell.

Fulton Financial ( FULT ) was up more than 7% after saying its Fulton Bank subsidiary acquired substantially all of the assets and deposits of Republic First Bank from the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation, doubling its presence across the region.

SoFi Technologies ( SOFI ) was down more than 4% even after reporting that it swung to Q1 earnings as revenue increased during the period.