Mike Maddox Exits First Busey Corporation and Busey Bank

First Busey Corporation officially closed its acquisition of Leawood-based CrossFirst Bank on March 1, 2025.

The First Busey Corporation Board of Directors announced Michael Maddox has separated from the company and its subsidiary Busey Bank, effective immediately. Photo credit: Matt Kocourek.

Posted January 28, 2026

Mike Maddox, the former president and vice chairman of First Busey Corporation and president and CEO of the Busey Bank, has separated from the company, effective immediately.

The news of Madoxx’s departure from First Buesy was revealed in a 2025 fourth-quarter earnings report. In the report, the company stated that the current chairman and CEO of First Busey, Van A. Dukeman, will serve at least two more years and assume the roles of president of First Busey and CEO of Busey Bank.

Additionally, the First Busey board of directors appointed T. Anthony Hammond, Busey Bank’s current president of regional banking, to serve as the president of Busey Bank.

Maddox was planned to assume the role of CEO of the holding company in 2026 as part of First Busey’s acquisition of Leawood-based CrossFirst Bankshares Inc. First Busey officially closed the nearly $917 million acquisition of CrossFirst in March 2025. 

First Buesy moved its headquarters to the former CrossFirst headquarters, located at 11440 Tomahawk Creek Pkwy. Busey Bank’s headquarters remained in Champaign, Illinois.

The earrings report deferred to a Form 8-K that stated, subject to the effectiveness of a release of claims, Maddox will receive cash severance of $4,363,333, representing the base salary and annual bonuses he would have earned through the third anniversary of Busey’s acquisition of CrossFirst Bankshares, Inc, as well as his yearly bonus for 2025.

Maddox is bound by his post-employment noncompetition, nonsolicitation, and nondisclosure obligations under his employment agreement and letter agreement entered into with First Busey on August 26, 2024. Maddox was named Ingram’s 2025 Executive of the Year in Ingram’s January 2025 edition.