CLEVELAND, Dec. 5, 2013 /PRNewswire/ -- KeyBank (NYSE: KEY) was recognized today as one of America's most community-minded companies in the The Civic 50, an annual initiative that identifies and recognizes companies for their commitment to improve the quality of life in the communities where they do business. The survey was conducted by the National Conference on Citizenship (NCoC) and Points of Light, the nation's definitive experts on civic engagement, and published by Bloomberg News.

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"We believe that banks have a special responsibility to be a part of social and economic solutions," said KeyCorp Chairman and CEO Beth Mooney. "For us, it's important to take an active role in helping our clients and communities thrive through our lending and investing, community engagement, and grants focused on diversity, financial education, and workforce development. Constantly balancing mission with margin is not simple, but it has proven extremely rewarding."

"The results of this year's Civic 50 survey show that even the most civically engaged companies are doing more to make community engagement a top priority and a permanent aspect of their business strategy," said Michael Weiser, chairman of the Board, National Conference on Citizenship and Neil Bush, chairman of the Board, Points of Light, in a joint statement. "These 50 companies are showing others in the private sector how to boost the bottom line and make the world a better place."

This year's Civic 50 applicants were evaluated and accrued points based on several criteria, including how much financial and human resources are applied to civic improvement, whether internal and external resources are activated to maximize community impact, how a company's community engagement activities support its business interests, how broadly community engagement is supported and institutionalized within a company's policies, systems and incentives, and how a company measures the social and business value of its community engagement programs.

To learn more about The Civic 50 survey and the importance of civic engagement in corporate America, please visit www.Civic50.org.

About KeyCorp

KeyCorp (NYSE: KEY) was organized more than 160 years ago and is headquartered in Cleveland, Ohio. One of the nation's largest bank-based financial services companies, Key has assets of approximately $91 billion. Key provides deposit, lending, cash management and investment services to individuals, small and medium-sized businesses under the name of KeyBank N.A. Key also provides a broad range of sophisticated corporate and investment banking products, such as merger and acquisition advice, public and private debt and equity, syndications and derivatives to middle market companies in selected industries throughout the United States under the KeyBanc Capital Markets trade name. For more information, visit https://www.key.com/. KeyBank is Member FDIC.

SOURCE KeyCorp