First Financial Holdings Inc., the Charleston parent of First Federal Savings and Loan Association of Charleston, sold $65 million in preferred stock and a stock warrant to the U.S. Treasury Department today, according to a company filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission.

The sale is part of the Treasury’s Capital Purchase Program under the Troubled Asset Relief Program, the filing says. First Financial announced its preliminary approval Monday.

The Treasury bought 65,000 shares of preferred stock and a 10-year warrant to buy 483,391 shares of First Financial common stock at $20.17 a share. The preferred stock pays a 5% annual dividend for five years and 9% after that.

“This capital, which is being provided at favorable market terms, will enhance our capacity to support our market areas through expanded lending activities and economic development,” President and CEO A. Thomas Hood said in Monday’s announcement. He said it would also add flexibility for “strategic opportunities that likely will be available to us as the financial services industry consolidates.”

First Federal was already “well-capitalized” under regulatory guidelines on Sept. 30, the company said. Based on that date’s figures, the new money would lift the bank’s Tier 1 leverage ratio from 9.75% to about 12.34%.

The deal comes with conditions. For up to three years, First Financial can’t raise its quarterly common dividend above 25.5 cents a share, the last amount it declared before the sale, the filing says. The company is also subject to executive pay limits in the Emergency Economic Stabilization Act of 2008, and six senior executives, including Hood, waived any claims over pay changes the Treasury’s rules require.

First Financial earned $22.6 million in the fiscal year that ended Sept. 30, down from $25.1 million a year earlier. In October, Hood said credit quality had weakened in the fiscal fourth quarter as consumers in its markets faced “higher unemployment, lower home values and increased living expenses.”

First Federal operates 58 offices in the Charleston area, Horry, Georgetown, Florence and Beaufort counties and Brunswick County, North Carolina.