PITTSFIELD, Mass. (PRNewswire) — Berkshire Hills Bancorp Inc. (NYSE: BHLB) held its annual meeting of shareholders on Thursday, May 9, in Pittsfield.

Chairman, President and CEO Michael P. Daly summarized Berkshire's accomplishments in 2012. They included strong organic growth and team recruitment, along with the acquisitions of CBT and Beacon Federal. The year's initiatives produced improved profitability and resulted in a 29 percent increase in core earnings per share. Berkshire's 2012 stock returns exceeded 10 percent, and the quarterly cash dividend was increased by 6 percent, providing a yield of over 3 percent. Daly concluded with a summary of the encouraging prospects for Berkshire's further growth and development.

Shareholders approved all proposals which were presented at the meeting. These included:

• The election of three existing directors to new three-year terms: John B. Davies; Rodney C. Dimock;  and J. Williar Dunlaevy
•  The election of one new director to a three-year term: Laurie Norton Moffatt
• Approval of the Berkshire Hills Bancorp Inc. 2013 Equity Incentive Plan
• Approval of a non-binding proposal to give advisory approval of the company's executive compensation
• Ratification of the selection of PricewaterhouseCoopers LLP as the company's independent registered public accounting firm for fiscal 2013

BACKGROUND

Berkshire Hills Bancorp is the parent of Berkshire Bank. The company has approximately $5.2 billion in assets and 73 full service branch offices in Massachusetts, New York, Connecticut and Vermont providing personal and business banking, insurance and wealth management services.

FORWARD LOOKING STATEMENTS

This document may contain forward-looking statements as defined in the Private Securities Litigation Reform Act of 1995. There are several factors that could cause actual results to differ significantly from expectations described in the forward-looking statements. For a discussion of such factors, please see Berkshire's most recent reports on Forms 10-K and 10-Q filed with the Securities and Exchange Commission and available on the SEC's website at www.sec.gov. Berkshire does not undertake any obligation to update forward-looking statements made in this document.