The Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation (FDIC) recently released their Community Reinvestment Act (CRA) exam schedule for the 3rd quarter of 2019. Whether your institution is on the exam schedule or not, it is important to keep up-to-date regarding knowledge of your assessment area. Below are useful resources for information regarding state, county, census tracts, and…
read article →The labor market report for August was mixed with slower job growth but higher wages. The always important labor report released last Friday was a mixed bag. Nonfarm payrolls only increased by 130,000 in August aided by a 25,000 increase in government workers as census workers were included. In addition, the job growth data for…
read article →The Task Force on Consumer Compliance of the Federal Financial Institutions Examination Council (FFIEC)[1] recently developed interagency examination procedures relating to the creation of comprehensive consumer protections for prepaid accounts. These procedures reflect Consumer Financial Protection Bureau’s (CFPB’s) amendments to Regulations Z and E published in the Federal Register on November 22, 2016, April 25,…
read article →The inverted yield curve has only gotten wider as fears of recession grow. Another week of solid economic data, volatile stock markets and declines in market interest rates. The trade war with China continues to drive investors towards an expectation of recession as a result of tariffs and weak global growth. As yet, those fears…
read article →Mutual Bank Performance Holds Steady Throughout the First Half ‘19 Mutual banks nationally experienced little change in key financial performance metrics for the first half of 2019 compared with first quarter results. Mutual bank balance sheets nationally grew by 3.6 percent during the first half of 2019 compared with four percent during the first quarter…
read article →The bond market continues to price another Fed cut in September. Investors continue to focus on the waves of news on the trade war. Fed Chairman Powell gave his annual speech to the Jackson Hole economic forum on Friday. He indicated the U.S. economy is in good condition with growth accelerating on the strength of…
read article →The Consumer Financial Protection Bureau’s (CFPB) “Prepaid Rule,” originally introduced in October of 2016, went into effect on April 1, 2019. This Rule establishes consumer protections for certain prepaid financial products through amendments to both Regulation E and Regulation Z. “Prepaid accounts” warranting new protections include payroll card accounts, government benefit accounts, and certain accounts that…
read article →Status: Pending Lead Advisor(s): Rick Maroney & Paul Simoff
read article →Retail sales were much stronger than expected for July calling into question a recession. If the Federal Reserve is truly data dependent as they said they were after the rate cut in July, the retail sales data released last week would keep them on hold in September. The headline number was +0.7% for the month,…
read article →The title is a Latin phrase that effectively states, “after this, therefore because of this.” Succinctly, the reasoning that since event X followed event Y, then event X must have been caused by event Y. This informal fallacy is rooted in the belief that correlation is causation, consequently a conclusion based solely on the order…
read article →Earlier this year, FinCEN issued Advisory FIN-2019-A001, Advisory on the Financial Action Task Force-Identified Jurisdictions with Anti-Money Laundering and Combatting the Financing of Terrorism Deficiencies to reflect the Financial Action Task Force’s (FATF)1 recent updates to its list of jurisdictions with strategic anti-money laundering and combatting the financing of terrorism (AML/CFT) deficiencies. As part of the…
read article →Retail sales for July due out this Thursday will be a key data point for monetary policy. Volatility in financial markets continues to be stoked by a lack of progress on trade agreements,political instability in China and fears of a slowing economy. Global economic growth is slowing with few tools remaining to stimulate in Europe…
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