Banking Wire articles from July 2006

Banking Wire archives from July 2006

A Look at Whats New: Forum Solutions Adds To TAPS Enterprise.
July 3, 2006... INDIANAPOLIS -- FORUM Solutions, a wholly-owned subsidiary of FORUM Credit Union, has added seven new partners to the TAPS Enterprise Lending software platform. These financial institutions are now using TAPS in a live environment with...

A Look at Whats New: OSI Hosts Member Business Services Forums.
July 3, 2006... GLASTONBURY, Conn.- -- Open Solutions Inc. has hosted what it says will be the first in a series of Member Business Services Forums especially designed for credit unions interested in offering business and commercial services to their...

A Look at Whats New: EPL Moves Client CUs To i-Power Solution.
July 3, 2006... BIRMINGHAM, Ala. -- EPL reported it has successfully migrated more than 70% of its legacy system credit unions to its new i-POWER Open Architecture (OA) core processing solution, within the past year. Among those recently moving to i-POWER:...

A Look at Whats New: Synergent Signs GPM CU For Data Processing.
July 3, 2006... WESTBROOK, Maine. -- Synergent, a subsidiary of the Maine Credit Union League, has signed South Portland, Maine-based GPM CU for the firm's data processing and technology support services. The 10-year agreement will begin Nov. 1, Synergent...

A Look at Whats New: Digital Defense Updates Its Educational Offering.
July 3, 2006... SAN ANTONIO -- Digital Defense, Inc., a provider of network security compliance and risk management services, has updated its educational offering, Security Training, Education and Awareness Module (TEAM), a solution that enables financial...

A Look at Whats New: Fiserv Is Teaming Up With Pay By Touch.
July 3, 2006... BROOKFIELD, Wis. -- Fiserv has signed with Pay By Touch to have its ACCEL/Exchange EFT Network be the first electronic funds network to allow PIN-based debit transactions over the Internet. Pay by Touch's ATM Direct solution allows...

A Look at Whats New: Princeton eCom Adds Two CUs To Clientele.
July 3, 2006... PRINCETON, N.J. -- Princeton eCom reported it has contracted with two giant credit unions, Texas CU and Oregon Community CU, to provide its web-based PayAnyone electronic payments solution. PayAnyone features Princeton eCom's real-time...

A Look at Whats New: MATCU Extends Contract With FundsXpress.
July 3, 2006... MEMPHIS, Tenn. -- Memphis Area Teachers' CU has signed a multi-year extension of its online banking deal with FundsXpress Financial Network. Under the deal, FundsXpress will provide the $510-million credit union with its fxEnhanced...

No Need To Lose SLEEP over IT, says 1 Analyst.
July 3, 2006... SANDY, Utah and HILLSBORO, Ore. -- If CEOs are losing sleep over technology, then there's something wrong with their systems, according to one core processing and software provider to credit unions. "The simple truth is that CEOs and senior...

Where To Get More IT Information.
July 3, 2006... WEST PALM BEACH, Fla. -- Credit unions, CU associations, consultants and vendors named these resources to help CEOs keep tabs on IT, below. In addition to the state and national association meetings, those interviewed indicated the following...

ON DEADLINE: Visa Confirms Breach.
July 5, 2006... SAN FRANCISCO -- Visa USA confirmed a new ATM security breach last week that may have compromised customer accounts at dozens of credit unions and banks. The latest breach apparently dates back to February, when Visa began notifying card...

ON DEADLINE: Provision Added To Bill.
July 5, 2006... WASHINGTON -- Members of the Senate Banking Committee have agreed to add at least one more credit union provision to a scaled-back version of the regulatory relief bill before they send the bill back to the House Financial Services Committee...

ON DEADLINE: Biz CUSO Inks A Rembrandt.
July 5, 2006... MINNEAPOLIS -- CU Business Group said last week it will use Wolters Kluwer Financial Services Rembrandt Lending System for member business loan documentation. Rembrandt simplifies the documentation process and allows credit unions to offer...

ON DEADLINE: Carjacker Drives Away With Toddler.
July 5, 2006... LOVELAND, Colo. -- A mother was reunited with her two-year-old son last week, minutes after police captured a man who had stolen her car with the infant in it as she was stopping to cash a check at her credit union. The woman, who was...

More Information: Amendments Proposed To Conversion Rules.
July 5, 2006... ALEXANDRIA, Va. -- The NCUA Board last week proposed amendments to its rules that would allow greater member involvement in decisions to convert to a mutual savings bank and, at the same time, reduce the opportunities for outsiders to profit...

Less Service: Bankers Force NCUA To Limit Expansions.
July 5, 2006... ALEXANDRIA, Va. -- Backed into a corner by the bankers, the NCUA Board took the highly contentious move last week of barring all but multiple group federal credit unions from its popular underserved expansions program. The board voted...

Bank To Acquire CU, Premium To Be Paid For Members Deposits.
July 5, 2006... COLUMBUS, Ohio -- In the first deal of its kind, insurance giant Nationwide Financial Services announced it is starting up its own bank by acquiring its employees credit union, Nationwide FCU. The rare deal is being structured as a merger...

Taming GodzillIT.
July 5, 2006... BROCKTON, Mass. -- Information Technology is a nine-headed monster to some, but a credit union CEO here thinks IT can be tamed like any other business area. "Information Technology management is not that different from credit or...

FSCC Inks Shared Branching Kiosks Deal With 7-Eleven.
July 5, 2006... LAS VEGAS -- Financial Services Centers Cooperative signed an agreement with Dallas-based 7-Eleven that eventually will allow members of FSCC-network credit unions to use shared branching kiosks at 2,250 7-Eleven locations across the United...

Calling All Best CU Practices.
July 5, 2006... WEST PALM BEACH, Fla. -- The Credit Union Journal is announcing its Call for Entries for its Best Practices awards. The Journal published its inaugural Best Practices issue in November 2005 and featured nearly two-dozen peer- leading ideas as...

Trust Games.
July 6, 2006... It's an issue that seems to be coming to a head: If bank reps are dealing with high-net-worth clients, at what point do they encroach on trust's territory? As far as many trust officers are concerned, it already has, and they're not happy about...

Mutual Fund Retention Rates Are a Mixed Blessing.
July 6, 2006... Mutual fund retention rates jumped to record highs over the last two years, a sign that "smart" investors have been the driving force of the recent bull market and a trend that may soon change. Boston-based Dalbar's Quantitative Analysis of...

A Look at Whats New: OSI Hosts Member Business Services Forums.
July 6, 2006... GLASTONBURY, Conn.- -- Open Solutions Inc. has hosted what it says will be the first in a series of Member Business Services Forums especially designed for credit unions interested in offering business and commercial services to their...

A Look at Whats New: EPL Moves Client CUs To i-Power Solution.
July 6, 2006... BIRMINGHAM, Ala. -- EPL reported it has successfully migrated more than 70% of its legacy system credit unions to its new i-POWER Open Architecture (OA) core processing solution, within the past year. Among those recently moving to i-POWER:...

A Look at Whats New: Digital Defense Updates Its Educational Offering.
July 6, 2006... SAN ANTONIO -- Digital Defense, Inc., a provider of network security compliance and risk management services, has updated its educational offering, Security Training, Education and Awareness Module (TEAM), a solution that enables financial...

A Look at Whats New: Fiserv Is Teaming Up With Pay By Touch.
July 6, 2006... BROOKFIELD, Wis. -- Fiserv has signed with Pay By Touch to have its ACCEL/Exchange EFT Network be the first electronic funds network to allow PIN-based debit transactions over the Internet. Pay by Touch's ATM Direct solution allows...

A Look at Whats New: Princeton eCom Adds Two CUs To Clientele.
July 6, 2006... PRINCETON, N.J. -- Princeton eCom reported it has contracted with two giant credit unions, Texas CU and Oregon Community CU, to provide its web-based PayAnyone electronic payments solution. PayAnyone features Princeton eCom's real-time...

No Need To Lose SLEEP over IT, says 1 Analyst.
July 6, 2006... SANDY, Utah and HILLSBORO, Ore. -- If CEOs are losing sleep over technology, then there's something wrong with their systems, according to one core processing and software provider to credit unions. "The simple truth is that CEOs and senior...

Rants and Raves.
July 6, 2006... The Ones That Got Away I just read your "One Hundred Fifteen Years of Innovation" issue and was astonished by your omission of certainly one-and most probably two-of the most significant innovations in modern banking. The first is...

For Victims of ID Fraud, Losses are Not the Same: Age, income and ethnicity factor into who is most vulnerable to identity fraud. Hispanics and African-Americans, aged 25 to 34, have a 56 percent higher chance than all other consumers of being victimized.
July 6, 2006... That identity fraud is on the rise is concern enough for consumers and financial institutions. But that its most vulnerable victims-Hispanics and African-Americans, aged 25 to 34-suffer longer and sustain larger financial losses than other...

A $6 Trillion Market: Ivy League Moms.
July 7, 2006... With investment firms employing well-funded marketing departments and consulting firms galore, one would think undiscovered demographic groups were about as easy to find today as living dinosaurs. In fact, a highly profitable one may have...

A Merger of Alabama Regionals Could Be Good for Reps.
July 7, 2006... Mergers between cross-town banking rivals tend to be unpleasant for employees, who often discover that pink slips are soon to follow. That's likely to be the case for workers at Regions Financial and AmSouth, two large regional banks...

Where To Get More IT Information.
July 7, 2006... WEST PALM BEACH, Fla. -- Credit unions, CU associations, consultants and vendors named these resources to help CEOs keep tabs on IT, below. In addition to the state and national association meetings, those interviewed indicated the following...

A Look at Whats New: Forum Solutions Adds To TAPS Enterprise.
July 7, 2006... INDIANAPOLIS -- FORUM Solutions, a wholly-owned subsidiary of FORUM Credit Union, has added seven new partners to the TAPS Enterprise Lending software platform. These financial institutions are now using TAPS in a live environment with...

Study Finds One Appeal Of Electronic Payments-Consumer Can Pay Later.
July 7, 2006... ELIZABETHTOWN, Ky. -- Authors of an extensive, new study into the habits of consumer bill payers say they have found both compelling evidence and confirmation that consumers are increasingly turning to electronic methods to pay their bills and...

Have You Taken Time To Sharpen Your Saw?: Long-Term Gains To Be Had In Revising Practices At Your Credit Union.
July 7, 2006... Best-selling author Steven Covey often talks about cutting down trees with a dull saw as an analogy for a chronic problem in today's business world. People in business continue to use a "dull saw" because they don't take the time to stop and...

What Your Data Security Strategy Should Include.
July 7, 2006... Like other financial institutions and corporate entities, credit unions today are facing unprecedented challenges in managing and protecting their critical infrastructure. Security concerns, complex and disparate technology and stringent,...

EECU Offering Members E-Mail Alerts On Various Activities.
July 7, 2006... FORT WORTH, Texas -- EECU is now offering its members free e-mail alerts. Members can sign up through the $560-million EECU's home banking product to have e-mails sent about account activity by choosing the type of alert they want to receive....

CRA Performance: Four of 22 Banks Ranked As 'Outstanding' by OCC: Remaining 18 were 'satisfactory'.
July 7, 2006... Four of 22 banks whose Community Reinvestment Act performance was recently made public by the Office of the Comptroller of the Currency earned "outstanding" rankings. The list included 18 "satisfactory" banks, while none was rated "needs to...

Card-Processing Network: Will It or Won't It? BofA Keeps Card Close to Vest.: Did CEO Ken Lewis prematurely show his hand?
July 7, 2006... Though Bank of America has been busy trying to downplay CEO Ken Lewis's musings about the bank's interest in starting a card network and a fifth new card brand, it hasn't stopped analysts from imagining what the industry would be like with a...

Up and Running: Associated Bank's Justin Levanetz seizes his opportunity to move into fees.
July 10, 2006... When Associated Bank introduced an initiative to propel its advisers into fee business two years ago, financial planner Justin Levanetz jumped at the chance. While the majority of his book is still an amalgamation of stocks, bonds, mutual...

Putting Fees First: At supercommunity Gateway Bank, fee business is the lifeblood of its investment program.
July 10, 2006... While most small banks build up their brokerage programs slowly, Gateway Bank & Trust Co. jumped in with both feet-well, sort of. After floundering briefly with a program that began in 1998, the bank relaunched the program in 2000 under the...

READER QUESTION #1.
July 10, 2006... Our credit union is to go through a merger in the late third quarter. We're midsized, but are not the surviving operation. What kinds of equipment can we sell, what, if anything do we need to do, and what are the risks? Rick Fleming,...

READER QUESTION #2.
July 10, 2006... We've made a considerable investment over the past five years in technology solutions across the enterprise. We formed a three-person committee to examine where technology can help us reduce or redeploy personnel. In your experience, where is...

Wi-Fi Networks Get Short Shrift On Security Front Opening CUs, Banks To Fraud.
July 10, 2006... BOSTON -- While most financial institutions are extremely effective at protecting their wired communication networks, few give wireless network access the same level of security and attention, according to a new study. The new TowerGroup...

Beyond Mom's Maiden Name: Security Firms Look To Put The 'Challenge' Back Into Challenge Questions.
July 10, 2006... NEW YORK -- Challenge questions, the prompts many companies use to authenticate customers' identity online, are themselves giving rise to a new generation of customer service challenge. The questions, the classic example of which is the...

CU Figure Nominated To FHLB Oversight Panel.
July 10, 2006... WASHINGTON -- Former NCUA Board member Geoff Bacino, now an executive with Centrix Financial, was nominated by President Bush to a seat on the Federal Housing Finance Board, the panel that regulates the 12 regional Federal Home Loan Banks....

NCUA Urges CUs, Members To Go Direct.
July 10, 2006... WASHINGTON -- NCUA joined other financial regulators in a Treasury promotion aimed at encouraging people to receive their federal benefits through direct deposit. While the latest campaign, dubbed GoDirect, was timed to coincide with the...

Hits and Has-Beens.
July 10, 2006... Bank of America scored its third federal-employee coup with the hiring of Larry Di Rita, an aide to Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld, who is taking a communications post at the bank's corporate and investment bank. William J. Fox, former...

Fresh Ink.
July 10, 2006... 1. First Community Bancorp will pay $277 million in cash and stock to acquire Community Bancorp. Community Bancorp has $888 million in assets and 12 branches in San Diego and Riverside counties. The deal will create a bank with 26 branches and...

A Manager Apart: To tap the growth in separately managed accounts, advisers must master the basics of manager selection.
July 11, 2006... Separately managed accounts are big business, and one that around 70% of advisers say they wish to tap, according to Financial Research Corp in Boston. By the end of March, total assets in managed accounts reached $736.4 billion, an 8.6%...

Bringing TIPRA Into Focus: Recent tax tweaks not only provide clarity, they also present some interesting opportunities.
July 11, 2006... Wealth planners were handed a new tax law in May that may not have revolutionized the landscape, but it does give bank reps several important opportunities to curb their clients' tax bites. There was some disappointment, however, that Congress...

CUNA Builds Campaign War Chest To $582,000.
July 11, 2006... WASHINGTON -- CUNA reported last week its political action committee raised $182,000 last month and distributed $115,000, leaving it with $582,000 as the two-year congressional election cycle enters its fourth quarter. Among the...

Congress Eyes Cards Interchange.
July 11, 2006... WASHINGTON -- Congress announced plans to step into the cards interchange wars with hearings on credit card interchange rates. Retailers have filed more than 40 lawsuits against card giants MasterCard and Visa, claiming the two dominant players...

Mid-Sized CUs In Merger Mania.
July 11, 2006... SYRACUSE, N.Y. -- In a merger of equals, Power FCU and Empire FCU have agreed to merge, the fourth combination of two large credits in the past few weeks. The merger will create a credit union with more than $600 million in assets and...

How Do You Rate?: CUs Must Measure Underserved Outreach Efforts.
July 11, 2006... ORLANDO -- Credit unions must begin to measure and grade themselves - and the movement as a whole - on their ability to reach out to low-wealth households, minorities, immigrants and Hispanics, according to one credit union advocate. ...

Migrating To Page One: Immigration Issues Now On The Front Burner.
July 11, 2006... ORLANDO -- It seems like only yesterday that immigration problems were relegated to the back burner, but now they are burning hot, according to David Grace, senior manager for regulatory monitoring for the World Council of Credit Unions. ...

CUs Urged To 'Stand Up To The Examiners'.
July 11, 2006... ORLANDO -- CUNA economist Bill Hampel a mixed-bag credit union forecast for the rest of 2006 and into 2007. Return on Average Assets (ROA) will rise to 0.80% next year from this year's forecasted 0.73%. "But I don't believe this...

'The Banks Made Me Do It!' Says Lay in Bank-Fraud Trial.
July 11, 2006... It was the banks' fault. So says former Enron Corp. chairman Kenneth Lay, who says Bank of America, Compass Bancshares and JPMorgan Chase should have notified him that when he signed their loan documents, he was violating loan provisions that...

Noted and Noteworthy.
July 11, 2006... Oops. Japan's high-tech money-printing bureau was humbled recently when 39,400 problem bills were discovered after some ATMs rejected them. The 1,000-yen bill, among several redesigned in 2004 with sophisticated security fraud-fighting...

Portfolio Management Techniques: The efficient frontier and the capital asset pricing model.
July 12, 2006... This article, which continues last month's discussion of theories and techniques for managing investment portfolios, is part of a series of monthly columns provided by the Investment Management Consultants Association. Mean-variance...

America's Retirement Crossroads: Hoosier state reps see their businesses change as the retirement boom takes hold.
July 12, 2006... Mark Blubaugh, financial services manager for LPL's program at First Federal Savings Bank in Rochester; Megan Dean, a Uvest rep at Horizon Investment Management in Michigan City; and Chip Wheling, program manager and OSJ for Raymond James at...

Bush OKs Katrina Bailout For Homeowners, Lenders.
July 12, 2006... WASHINGTON -- President Bush has signed an emergency spending bill that will provide $4.2 billion to bail out Louisiana homeowners uninsured for flooding caused by hurricanes Katrina and Rita last year. The money will be used to grant up to...

Digital Insight Launches Repurchase.
July 12, 2006... CALABASAS, Calif. -- Digital Insight Corp. has launched a repurchase of up to $50 million of the company's common stock over the next 12 months. The share repurchase comes on the heels of DI's completion of $100 million in share...

Outgoing Board Lauded; New Leadership Installed.
July 12, 2006... DURHAM, N.C. -- The National Federation of CDCU's closed its 32nd Annual Meeting with a changing of the guard, saying goodbye to three long-time leaders of its executive committee and welcoming new members of the board. "How can you...

Rogers Elected Chair Of CDCU Federation.
July 12, 2006... DURHAM, N.C. -- NRS Community Development Credit Union and its CEO, Eunice Rogers, may not fit the typical CU trade association leadership mold, but then again, the National Federation of Community Development Credit Unions isn't the typical...

Co-op Chocolate Provides Sweet Solidarity.
July 12, 2006... DURHAM, N.C. -- Forget the usual conference trinkets. The NFCDCU made a sweet statement by instead distributing a gourmet chocolate bar to attendees of its 32nd Annual Meeting and 4th Latino Credit Union Conference here. The accompanying...

CUJ Q&A: Rogue FCU's Heston Charlton has had to put up with a lot in life, thanks to his name. But his brothers think he's the lucky one.
July 12, 2006... MEDFORD, Ore. -- Sure, Gwyneth Paltrow named her children Apple and Moses, but it's not every day that you meet an "Average Joe" named Heston Charlton-but it turns out there really is something for everyone in credit union land. When The...

The Brouhaha Over Trust, B-D Rules: Banks have faced uncertainty on a number of trust and broker-dealer questions since GLB in 1999. Now, a proposed provision would force the SEC to work with the industry to draft rules.
July 12, 2006... Banks are holding their breath for passage of a provision, now part of the regulatory-relief legislation winding its way though Congress, which would eject them from the legal limbo they've been immersed in since the Gramm-Leach-Bliley Act was...

Network Management: Managing Radical Network Changes: Overwhelmed by business and regulatory complexities, banks are relying on automated configuration solutions to handle hundreds or thousands of network devices. That's overload.
July 12, 2006... It's been six years since Cabletron Systems left the network switching and router business to the Ciscos of the world. Another dot.com-era telecom equipment maker, Bay Networks, became part of the Nortel family during the Clinton...

Law To Ease Loan Consolidations.
July 13, 2006... WASHINGTON -- Congress approved legislation repealing the "single holder rule" for student loans that forced students who borrowed all of their federal loans from one lender to consolidate with the same lender. The bill will allow...

Conference Garners Spanish-language Press.
July 13, 2006... DURHAM, N.C. -- The 4th Annual Lation Credit Union Conference, held in conjunction with the National Federation of Community Credit Union's 32nd Annual Meeting, garnered media coverage from two Spanish-language media networks. NFCDCU...

BenSoft, Metavante Team Up.
July 13, 2006... SAN DIEGO, Calif. -- BenSoft, Inc., a provider of automated reimbursement plan software, is working with Metavante, specializing in linking employee benefit accounts, to integreate the MBI Benefits Card. Under the terms of the agreement,...

Sealed With A Kiss: After 80 Years, Postal CU Says Goodbye To Its Downtown St. Paul Flagship Office.
July 13, 2006... WOODBURY, Minn. -- Celebrating its 80th anniversary, Postal Credit Union had to shutter what used to be its most important office in downtown St. Paul. "Here we are in our 80th year, and we have to close what used to be our flagship...

Tale of a Turnaround: How A Small Credit Union Has Reversed Its Fortunes Locally And Gotten Involved Internationally.
July 13, 2006... DETROIT, Mich. -- Not that long ago, Communicating Arts Credit Union's future was in so much doubt that its board and CEO were actively searching for a merger partner. With no takers willing to hand over their reins-a condition that CACU's...

ATM Fees Remain Controversial Topic.
July 13, 2006... ATLANTA -- A majority of ATM users would switch financial institutions in order to be able to use ATMs anywhere in the country without paying a fee, according to a recent research study by Synergistics Research Corp. The study, entitled,...

Debit Cards Challenging Credit Card Revenue.
July 13, 2006... NEEDHAM, Mass. -- While credit card issuance has historically provided substantial revenues to financial services providers, recent changes in a variety of consumer behaviors-including a continued shift to debit cards and growing adoption of...

The Blender Mender: Helping Bridal Couples Take The Tacky Out Of Asking For Money.
July 13, 2006... WYOMISSING, Penn. -- Discovery FCU here has become the latest to target newlyweds with a new type of deposit account aimed at friends and families. Discovery FCU's Wedding Registry Account to accept cash gifts versus wedding guests picking...

Beyond Demographics: Tracking Buying Trends: Who knew prospective first-time home buyers love three FOX shows: "Family Guy," Simpsons" and "War at Home?" That kind of detail is making bank marketers salivate.
July 13, 2006... When Fallon Worldwide was searching for a strategy to win Citibank's business in 1999, its market researchers were casting about for a new way for the retail giant to segment its customers. But scores of focus groups weren't yielding any...

AD Beat: All Play and Some Work Lets WaMu Choose Fun: Why is a bunch of aging bankers comical? Just ask WaMu, which is laughing all the way to the bank with a new campaign that has prompted a record spike in the number of new checking accounts.
July 13, 2006... Washington Mutual likes to play seriously. Its new ad campaign, which tweaks the staid world of banking, certainly is fun-loving, even a little goofy. The TV and print ads in newspapers, magazines and on billboards, which feature a group...

LSI Unveils WebClose Feature.
July 14, 2006... ELGIN, Ill. -- Lending Solutions Inc. launched its WebClose feature to communicate over the Internet with credit union members during the loan origination process. WebClose, an interactive Web-based consumer loan origination feature,...

Small Credit Unions At 4th Quarter, 2005.
July 14, 2006... WASHINGTON -- Determining how a credit union stands relative to its peers is a complex issue. Callahan & Associates, Washington, D.C., has attempted to do so with its Return to the Member ranking system. According to Callahan's, Return to...

Kiosks Add Self-Service To Shared Branching.
July 14, 2006... LAS VEGAS -- Kiosks are the next generation of self-service devices for members of credit unions or other financial institutions, according to two representatives from a company that makes software for financial networks. "Self-service...

Shared Call Center Helps CUs Answer Phone 24/7.
July 14, 2006... LAS VEGAS -- The advent of the Internet allowing people to do and see thing anywhere at any time has created a 24/7 world-but credit unions and other financial institutions largely have tried to maintain "banker hours" to their peril. ...