Sep. 30, 2009 (Business Wire) -- The South Financial Group, Inc. (NASDAQ: TSFG) announced that its Board of Directors has declared a quarterly cash dividend of $12.50 per share on its Fixed Rate Cumulative Perpetual Preferred Stock (Series 2008-T) issued to the U.S. Treasury Department under its voluntary Capital Purchase Program. This amount is based on a rate per annum of 5% and is payable on November 15, 2009 to the preferred stock shareholder of record as of November 1, 2009.

Also, TSFG’s Board of Directors declared a quarterly cash dividend of $25.00 per share on the 4,650 outstanding shares of Mandatory Convertible Non-cumulative Preferred Stock (Series 2008D-V and Series 2008D-NV). This dividend totals $116,250 in aggregate and is payable on November 1, 2009 to preferred stock shareholders of record as of October 15, 2009.

General Information

The South Financial Group is a bank holding company focused on serving small businesses, middle market companies, and retail customers in the Carolinas and Florida. At June 30, 2009, it had approximately $12.6 billion in total assets and 177 branch offices. TSFG operates Carolina First Bank, which conducts banking operations in North Carolina and South Carolina (as Carolina First Bank), in Florida (as Mercantile Bank), and on the Internet (as Bank CaroLine). At June 30, 2009, approximately 46% of TSFG’s total customer deposits were in South Carolina, 42% were in Florida, and 12% were in North Carolina. Investor information is available at www.thesouthgroup.com.