Banking and Lending

Bank Failures and Rescue Test Yellen’s Decades of Experience
By Fatima Hussein | The Associated Press | March 27, 2023 | ReprintsWorking against the clock to stop a developing banking crisis, Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen had until sunset on Sunday, March 12, to come up with a plan to calm the U.S. economy.

Fed’s Unwanted Ally in Bid to Tame Inflation: Credit Crunch
By Paul Wiseman | March 24, 2023 | Reprints | Unlock Link
The Federal Reserve is getting some unwanted help in its drive to slow the U.S. economy and defeat the worst bout of inflation in four decades: a cutback in bank lending.

AP Poll: Americans’ Faith in Banks Low After Failures
By Paul Wiseman and Hannah Fingerhut | The Associated Press | March 23, 2023 | Reprints | Unlock Link
Only 10 percent of U.S. adults say they have high confidence in the nation’s banks and other financial institutions in the wake of Silicon Valley Bank’s collapse.

Fed Signals Rate Hikes Could Be Near End
By Christopher Rugaber | The Associated Press | March 23, 2023 | Reprints | Unlock Link
The Federal Reserve extended its year-long fight against high inflation Wednesday by raising its key interest rate by a quarter-point despite concerns that higher borrowing rates could worsen the turmoil that has gripped the banking system.

Fed Faces Blurrier Economic Outlook as It Weighs Rate Hike
By Christopher Rugaber | The Associated Press | March 22, 2023 | Reprints | Unlock Link
The Federal Reserve is grappling with a hazier economic picture clouded by turmoil in the banking industry and still-high inflation just as it meets to decide whether to keep raising interest rates or declare a pause.

Yellen Says Bank Situation ‘Stabilizing,’ System Is ‘Sound’
By Fatima Hussein | The Associated Press | March 21, 2023 | Reprints | Unlock Link
Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen is trying to project calm after regional bank failures, saying the U.S. banking system is “sound” but additional rescue arrangements “could be warranted” if any new failures at smaller institutions pose a risk to financial stability.

Anger in Congress on Bank Failures, but Division on What to Do
By Kevin Freking | The Associated Press | March 20, 2023 | Reprints | Unlock Link
While President Joe Biden called Monday on Congress to strengthen the rules for banks to prevent future failures, lawmakers are divided on whether any legislation is needed. And some congressional leaders are skeptical that a closely divided Congress will act at all.

New York Community Bank to Buy Failed Signature Bank
By Ken Sweet | The Associated Press | March 20, 2023 | Reprints | Unlock Link
New York Community Bank has agreed to buy a significant chunk of the failed Signature Bank in a $2.7 billion deal, the FDIC said late Sunday.

Megabanks Ink $30B Rescue Plan for First Republic
By Ken Sweet | The Associated Press | March 17, 2023 | Reprints | Unlock Link
Eleven of the biggest U.S. banks Thursday announced a $30 billion rescue package for First Republic Bank in an effort to prevent it from becoming the third to fail in less than a week and head off a broader banking crisis.

Banks, Experts Look for Ways to Prevent Next Crisis
By Paul Wiseman and Ken Sweet | The Associated Press | March 16, 2023 | Reprints | Unlock Link
None of the warning signs before Silicon Valley Bank’s collapse were secret. Yet bank supervisors at the Federal Reserve Bank of San Francisco and the state of California did nothing as the bank rolled over the cliff.

FedNow Payments System to Launch in July
March 16, 2023 | Reprints | Unlock Link
The FedNow Service, the Federal Reserve’s real-time payments platform, will launch in July.
Banks, Cores Increasingly at Odds Over Service
By Diane McLaughlin | March 16, 2023 | Reprints | Unlock Link
Banks are becoming less and less satisfied with the vendors providing their core banking technology, but few are looking to switch providers. The share of banks reporting satisfaction with their core technology provider fell 12 percentage points in two years according...

Fed Criticized for Missing SVB Red Flags
By Christopher Rugaber and Fatima Hussein | The Associated Press | March 15, 2023 | Reprints | Unlock Link
The Federal Reserve is facing stinging criticism for missing what observers say were clear signs that Silicon Valley Bank was at high risk of collapsing into the second-largest bank failure in U.S. history.

Fed to Review Its Supervision of Silicon Valley Bank
By Diane McLaughlin | March 14, 2023 | Reprints | Unlock Link
The Federal Reserve has launched a review of its own supervision of Silicon Valley Bank following the bank’s failure.

Will SVB Crisis Lead to Interest Rate Cut?
By Stan Choe | The Associated Press | March 13, 2023 | Reprints | Unlock Link
With bank stocks cratering Monday as investors in regional banks like First Republic Bank and now-defunct Silicon Valley Bank worry about what lender may be next to topple, some investors are calling for the Fed to make cuts to interest rates soon to stanch the bleeding.

Biden Urges Confidence in Banking System After Two Collapses
By Ken Sweet, Christopher Rugaber, Chris Megerian and Cathy Bussewitz | The Associated Press | March 13, 2023 | Reprints | Unlock Link
Despite message of reassurance from the White House, investors continued to dump shares in bank stocks Monday morning. Shares of First Republic Bank plunged more than 70 percent even after the bank said it was accessing emergency funding from the Federal Reserve.

FDIC Seizes $209B-Asset Bank as Investors Pull Cash
By Ken Sweet | The Associated Press | March 10, 2023 | Reprints | Unlock Link
The FDIC seized the assets of Silicon Valley Bank Friday morning, marking the largest bank failure since Washington Mutual during the height of the 2008 financial crisis.

CFPB Touts NSF Fee Wins vs. Banks
By Diane McLaughlin | March 10, 2023 | Reprints | Unlock Link
Some banks that charged multiple nonsufficient funds fees on a single item plan to refund the fees to consumers, and most of these institutions supervised by the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau have decided to eliminate nonsufficient funds fees altogether, the CFPB said in a statement Wednesday.

Bankwell Adds CBRE Exec to Board
March 10, 2023 | Reprints | Unlock Link
New Canaan-based Bankwell Financial Group Inc. has added CBRE’s Jeffrey Dunne to its board of directors.

Powell Says ‘No Decision’ on Fed’s Next Rate Move
By Christopher Rugaber | The Associated Press | March 9, 2023 | Reprints | Unlock Link
Federal Reserve Chairman Jerome Powell appeared to be trying to quell any assumption that the Fed has already decided to raise rates more aggressively based on a recent string of data that pointed to strong economic growth and still-high inflation.