CBSH vs ONB: Which Is the Better Buy in 2026?

Same yardstick, side by side (as of August 2026). Valuation lined up like this is most meaningful for two names in the same corner of the market, which these are. Figures are approximate; verify before investing.

Reading it: ONB is the cheaper of the two on forward earnings, but cheaper is not the same as better. Pair the valuation with growth (how far the forward P/E sits below the trailing P/E) and risk (beta) before you decide.

The metrics above tell you which is the marginally better business. The bigger risk for most people is not picking the slightly worse stock, it is over-concentrating. CBSH and ONB share themes, so owning both, or adding either to what you already hold, can quietly push a large share of your portfolio into one bet.

This is the part a generic comparison page cannot answer, because it depends on what you own. Connect your brokerage and Walnut shows your real, combined CBSH and ONB exposure, flags overlap with your existing positions, and tells you if adding one would tip you past a concentration you are comfortable with, read-only by default, with your login staying at your broker. Walnut is not an investment adviser.

Commerce Bancshares is the holding company for Commerce Bank, a regional bank founded more than 160 years ago and headquartered in Missouri. It runs roughly 140 branches across Missouri, Kansas, central Illinois, Oklahoma and Colorado, with commercial and wealth offices in additional states, offering consumer and commercial banking, payment solutions, wealth management and securities brokerage. The January 2026 close of its roughly $585 million all-stock acquisition of Florida-based FineMark Holdings added about $2.7 billion in loans, $3.1 billion in deposits and $8.7 billion in assets under administration, extending its reach into Florida, Arizona and South Carolina and deepening the wealth business.

Full CBSH guide

Old National Bancorp (NASDAQ: ONB) is the holding company for Old National Bank, a super-regional bank headquartered in Evansville, Indiana, with a large operational base in Chicago and a footprint concentrated across the Midwest. Following its May 2025 acquisition of Bremer Bank, the company holds roughly $70 billion in total assets and more than $30 billion in wealth assets under management, making it among the top 25 banking companies headquartered in the United States and one of the largest commercial banks in the Midwest. Like most banks, it earns money in two broad ways: net interest income, the spread between what it earns on loans and securities and what it pays on deposits (roughly $2.4 billion on a full-year 2025 basis), and noninterest fee income from wealth management, mortgage banking, treasury management, and capital markets.

Full ONB guide

Both fit overlapping themes, but they are not interchangeable. The useful comparison is which set of drivers and risks you want exposure to.

• CBSH drivers: FineMark acquisition and wealth expansion; Net interest income and margin.
• ONB drivers: Growth through acquisition and scale; Solid margin and cost discipline.

A faster-growing, richer-valued name usually swings harder, so it suits a longer horizon and a higher tolerance for volatility; a steadier, more cash-generative business suits a more conservative or income-minded investor. The honest test is which set of risks you could hold through a drawdown: As a regional bank, CBSH is exposed to interest-rate risk: falling rates can compress the net interest margin while rising rates can lift deposit costs and pressure loan demand. For ONB, old National is sensitive to interest rates: net interest income (about $2.4 billion in 2025) is its largest revenue line, so falling rates, deposit repricing, or an inverted yield curve can compress the margin and earnings.

Pick CBSH if you believe its drivers more; ONB if you believe its. Many investors hold both, but since they share themes, that is a concentrated bet, not diversification. Decide deliberately and check overlap. For the full detail, see the CBSH and ONB guides.

CBSH. Commerce Bancshares reported first-quarter 2026 revenue of about $475.7 million, up roughly 11% year over year, with net income near $141.6 million and EPS of about $0.96, the first full quarter reflecting FineMark. Trailing EPS was around $4.07, putting the P/E near 14.5, a valuation broadly in line with quality regional-bank peers. The dividend yield of roughly 2.0% sits on a payout ratio in the mid-20s percent of earnings, which the company has extended for 57 straight years.

ONB. Reading a regional bank means looking past a single earnings number to a few structural metrics. The net interest margin (around 3.65% in Q4 2025) shows how profitably the bank lends relative to its funding costs, and the efficiency ratio (an adjusted ~48.8% for 2025) measures how lean the operation is, where lower is better. Note the gap between GAAP EPS of $1.79 and adjusted EPS of $2.21, which reflects one-time merger and integration charges from the Bremer deal, so the adjusted figure is a cleaner read on underlying run-rate earnings. A trailing P/E near 13 is in the typical range for regional banks, which tend to trade at lower multiples than the broader market because their earnings are cyclical and rate-sensitive. The distinctive feature here is the growth-by-acquisition scale-up; the open question is how much of the Bremer benefit is already reflected in the share price versus still to be realized through integration.

Headline figures (approximate, APRIL 2026): CBSH shows revenue (ttm) ~$1.85 billion, net income (q1 2026) ~$141.6 million, eps (q1 2026) ~$0.96, total assets ~$32.9 billion (end 2025), ~$37 billion post-FineMark; ONB shows revenue (net interest income + fees, fy2025) ~$2.9 billion, net interest income (fy2025) ~$2.4 billion, net income to common (fy2025) ~$653 million GAAP (~$809 million adjusted), diluted eps (fy2025) $1.79 GAAP ($2.21 adjusted).

CBSH and ONB are related but distinct: same themes, different businesses and risks. Neither wins in the abstract; the right pick is whichever thesis you actually believe, sized so you are not over-concentrated in one theme. Walnut can show your combined CBSH and ONB exposure against your real portfolio. It is not an investment adviser.