Community Banker articles from August 2003

Community Banker archives from August 2003

A focus on checks. (front matter).(Brief Article)
August 1, 2003... Checks are in decline. That has been the conventional wisdom in banking for 40 years, and Federal Reserve data documenting the erosion in check volume drives the point home: 40 billion checks were written in 2002, down from 50 billion in 1995....

Personal commitments drive business at East Stroudsburg Savings. (personal profiles).(East Stroudsburg Savings Association )
August 1, 2003... "Hometown People, Hometown Commitment." This was a slogan developed by our ad agency nearly 20 years ago. It suggests our commitment to service. Indeed, our mantra is that service is our No. 1 product. Even though we used the slogan for...

Treasury's Peter Fisher answers bankers' burning questions. (view from the top).(Interview)
August 1, 2003... Peter R. Fisher, U.S. Treasury Under Secretary for Domestic Finance, developed a reputation as a strong leader on Wall Street and in Washington. Fisher, who is stepping down from his post Oct. 10, has been the Bush Administration's point person...

Weighing the options for taking your bank private. (market maker).
August 1, 2003... The Sarbanes-Oxley Act--along with related rules and regulations--has dramatically increased the costs and responsibilities that come with public company status. At the same time, community financial institutions are facing deteriorating...

ACB supports making FCRA preemptions permanent. (acb news).(America's Community Bankers)
August 1, 2003... In July testimony to the House Financial Services Committee, America's Community Bankers "wholeheartedly" endorsed the Fair and Accurate Credit Transactions Act and urged its adoption expeditiously. The proposed legislation would...

Proposed Massachusetts legislation could unintentionally encourage mutual bank conversions. (acb news).
August 1, 2003... Legislation being considered in Massachusetts could pressure mutual savings banks in the state to convert, and have a ripple effect nationally, warned America's Community Bankers on June 24. Testifying before a hearing of the Joint...

Financial literacy effort takes to the air on United. (acb news).(America's Community Bankers sponsors Suze Orman Financial Tips program through Sky Radio on United Airlines flights)(Brief Article)
August 1, 2003... Bankers traveling on United Airlines this fall should not be surprised if they hear ACB President and Chief Executive Officer Diane Casey-Landry on their headsets. Beginning Sept. 1, ACB is sponsoring the Suze Orman Financial Tips program...

Coping with changing regulations is focus of ACB compliance Conference in September. (acb news).(Brief Article)
August 1, 2003... The last two years have brought an onslaught of regulatory and legislative changes, and staying on top of compliance requirements can be difficult. To help community banks tackle this important challenge, America's Community Bankers is...

Educational opportunities: ACB and two leading universities join forces to offer MBA programs. (acb news).(Brief Article)
August 1, 2003... In July, America's Community Bankers announced two new MBA programs in partnership with the graduate business schools of two leading universities. These programs combine the accessibility and convenience of online education with the opportunity...

Former U.S. League CEO Norman Strunk dies at 86. (acb news).(Brief Article)
August 1, 2003... Norman W. Strunk, executive vice president and chief executive officer of the U.S. League of Savings Associations from 1952-1979, a predecessor organization of America's Community Bankers, died June 19 at the age of 86. Strunk first joined...

Spotlight: FFIEC supervisory workshop focuses on the cost of regulation. (acb news).(Federal Financial Institutions Examination Council )(Brief Article)
August 1, 2003... Approximately 125 examiners attended a Federal Financial Institutions Examination Council supervisory workshop on the economic cost of regulation, held June 9 in Arlington, Va. Speakers at the event included (pictured from left to right): E....

Professional development: responding to the challenges of today's Community Bank. (acb news).(Brief Article)
August 1, 2003... professional development Responding to the Challenges of Today's Community Bank Executive & Strategic Issues Senior Leadership Institute Aug. 3-8 Annual Convention, Directors' Forum & Market Expo...

Bankers meet and greet at ACB outreach events. (acb news).(Brief Article)
August 1, 2003... [ILLUSTRATIONS OMITTED] Caption: Carl R. Tannenbaum, group senior vice president and chief economist of LaSalle Bank Corp., presented his views about the economy at the ACB and Grant Thornton Cocktail Reception and Forum held June 2 in...

Senate and House unanimously pass check truncation legislation. (nationwide news).(Brief Article)
August 1, 2003... The Senate unanimously passed the Check Truncation Act of 2003 on June 27. The bill, S. 1334, incorporated language from a House of Representatives bill, H.R. 1474, also known as the Check Clearing for the 21st Century Act. The House passed...

Patching a bank's security vulnerabilities. (nationwide news).
August 1, 2003... Banks need to pay extra attention when evaluating software for weaknesses, according to guidance intended for all financial institutions from the Federal Deposit Insurance Corp. The guidance--Developing an Information System Patch...

Check processing volume continues to decline. (nationwide news).(Brief Article)
August 1, 2003... For the third year in a row, the number of checks processed by the Federal Reserve fell, according to the Fed's 89th annual report to Congress. Approximately 16.6 billion checks were processed in 2002, a 1.9 percent drop from 2001. Of...

Bank data collection to be modernized. (nationwide news).(Brief Article)
August 1, 2003... Banks may soon have a new way to file Call Reports, thanks to an agreement between Unisys and the Federal Financial Institutions Examination Council, acting through the Federal Deposit Insurance Corp. The agreement will assist regulators in the...

OCC newsletter highlights affordable rural housing. (nationwide news).(Brief Article)
August 1, 2003... "A bank interested in financing affordable housing at manageable risk and with a reasonable expectation of profit will quickly discover the value of partnering with state and federal housing agencies, national affordable-housing networks, and...

Banks top fortune list of fastest growing small businesses. (nationwide news).(Brief Article)
August 1, 2003... More than a third of the nation's 100 fastest growing small companies are financial institutions, according to the July/August issue of Fortune Small Business magazine. In all, 34 retail banks made the cut, more than any other industry. ...

Regulators ask for comments on Basel II proposal. (nationwide news).(Brief Article)
August 1, 2003... The four federal bank regulatory agencies in July released proposals to implement a new international Basel Capital Accord, known as Basel II, in the United States. Under the proposal, only l0 large international banks would be required to...

Department of Homeland Security reaches out to banks. (nationwide news).(Brief Article)
August 1, 2003... Financial institutions may soon have access to valuable law enforcement information and know-how regarding a variety of financial crimes through a program announced in July by Secretary of Homeland Security Tom Ridge. "It's critical we...

The state of the check: trends in truncation overdraft fees, free checking and more. (Cover Story).
August 1, 2003... Forty billion times a year, a check changes hands in the United States, whether in paper or electronic form. That's roughly 110 million checks a day, 4.6 million checks an hour, 76,000 checks a minute, or 1,250 checks a second. As large as...

What to consider when comparing life insurance programs.
August 1, 2003... According to industry figures, nearly half of the U.S. population has no life insurance. This gaping hole offers community banks an opportunity to fill an important need. Studies have found several reasons for this gap--including a lack of...

Ins and outs of mortgage subservicing for big and small banks.
August 1, 2003... No more than a very small percentage of community banks outsource their servicing work--and that doesn't appear likely to change anytime soon. Despite the argument that servicing is a scale business that makes economic sense only if a lender...

Community bank stocks: still Running with the bulls?
August 1, 2003... Community bank shares extended their winning streak in the year's first half, but they slipped behind the pace of the stock market overall during the big spring rally and entered the summer facing difficult questions about earnings growth. ...

Hitting for the rate cycle. (investment management).(interest rate cycles)
August 1, 2003... In baseball, if you are able to hit a single, a double, a triple, and a home run in the same game you are said to have "hit for the cycle." In investing, it would be very rare to find a portfolio manager able to find all four pivot points...

Identification rules may add a new know-your-customer standard. (compliance review).(Financial institutions need to have in place board-approved Customer Identification Programs (CIP) by Oct. 26, 2002)
August 1, 2003... When the USA PATRIOT Act was acted in October 2001, the rafters of the law did not consider that imposing additional requirements on consumers wishing to open accounts at financial institutions would create significant hurdles. The statute...

Correction.
August 1, 2003... An editing error in June's Compliance Review column ("Regulators Comment on Overdraft Protection Plan," page 58) reversed the meaning of Four bullet points. The OCC letter described in the article said overdraft protection programs with the...

The Georgia Fair Lending Act: preemption and exemption possibilities. (legal briefs).
August 1, 2003... Many mortgage lenders consider the Georgia Fair Lending Act to be one of the more onerous anti-predatory lending laws in the country. The Act was amended effective March 7 to correct certain unintended consequences and shift many of its...

What the hard insurance market means for community banks. (business solutions).(St. Paul Companies is leading insurer of community banks nationwide)(Interview)
August 1, 2003... The St. Paul Companies, an ACB Business Partner, is the leading insurer of community banks nationwide. Serving community banks for more than a century, The St. Paul provides unmatched expertise in insurance coverage, including directors and...

Banks becoming more likely to outsource their ATMs. (technology report).
August 1, 2003... Community banks are increasingly looking to outsourcing as a way to fill their automated teller machine needs, according to recent studies. Working with nonbank providers and banking alliance networks can help financial institutions in the...

More on the growth of surcharge-free ATM networks. (technology report).(Brief Article)
August 1, 2003... Offering access to automated teller machines without surcharges is an excellent way for financial institutions to increase demand deposit account accessibility beyond the boundaries of a proprietary ATM network, according to research by...

Compliance help for financial institutions. (technology report).
August 1, 2003... Complying with ever-changing state and local regulations can be a headache for bankers. Several new software packages have been introduced in the past few months to help banks solve these issues and avoid penalties. Predatory lending...

Report anticipates shift from IDS to firewall. (technology report).(Brief Article)
August 1, 2003... By 2005, intrusion detection systems (IDS) could be obsolete as a form of network security, according to research from Gartner, Inc. Often utilized as a first line of defense, IDSs detect unauthorized attempts to access a bank's computer...

Resistance remains for online banking adoption. (technology report).(Brief Article)
August 1, 2003... The top obstacle to consumer acceptance of Internet banking remains concern over the security of the system, according to a TowerGroup report entitled e-Security: Consumers' Perception Is the Bank's Reality. The report, which featured data...

Harvard study finds 2002 was housing's best year ever. (surveys & trends).(Brief Article)
August 1, 2003... By most measures, housing had its strongest year ever in 2002, according to the annual report of the Joint Center for Housing Studies of Harvard University. America's Community Bankers was among the sponsors of the study. "Residential...

Wealthy investors seek variety in asset allocations. (survey & trends).
August 1, 2003... Asset allocation and diversification are becoming increasingly important to wealthy investors, according to the 2003 World Wealth Report, released jointly by Cap Gemini Ernst & Young and Merrill Lynch. "During the bull market, the concept...

Few workers will job-hop even if economy improves. (surveys & trends).(Brief Article)
August 1, 2003... Approximately two out of three employees (65 percent).would be unlikely to change jobs within the next six months, even if the economy were to rebound, according to a recent survey by Accountemps. However, the survey also found that...

Meetings rank as biggest time wasters in the workplace. (surveys & trends).(Brief Article)
August 1, 2003... Feel like there is never enough time to get everything done? Maybe cutting down on meetings would help, suggests the findings of a recent survey by OfficeTeam. More than a quarter (27 percent) of the 613 polled workers identified meetings...

Contactless payment options on the rise. (surveys & trends).(radio frequency identification (RFID) technology)(Brief Article)
August 1, 2003... Consumers may soon be able to pay for many transactions without using cash or payment cards, according to a study from Celent Communications. New payment options will offer flexibility to customers, giving them the option of not carrying...

Hometown leaders make a difference. (chairman's corner).
August 1, 2003... Every community banker knows the thrill of leadership and the personal pleasure of making things better for your neighbors. For me, it is all the more enjoyable because I do it in my hometown. I grew up in Rahway, N.J., and so did my...