These types of schemes rarely pay off in the end, and they certainly never represent an efficient use of funding. Banks would, therefore, be well-advised to make some immediate price-structure changes.

Reduced lending, fewer leaders in times of crisis and less innovation – that’s what we’d have if only the biggest banks were allowed to survive.

Receiving Wide Coverage ... Waiting for Volcker: News on the contents of the Volcker Rule continues to trickle in ahead of next week's vote on the long-awaited Dodd-Frank provision. The Journal reports that the rule will require bank executives to guarantee their firms are in compliance with the regulation, which, incidentally, marks another requirement banks lobbied against that wound up in regulators' final proposal. Meanwhile, an unnamed senior Treasury official tells the FT the rule will…

Nacha says the industry wants faster processing and is “working to make it happen in a way that is a win-win for all.” The biggest banks are in no rush.

As consumer groups turn their attention to smaller institutions, they bring lending disparities to regulators’ attention. The regulators seem to take these issues more seriously than during bank megamergers’ heyday.

There seems to be undue emphasis being placed on a provision that, generally, would have done nothing to avoid the recent financial crisis. Ultimately, however, the Volcker Rule has to be judged like any other regulation: do its benefits outweigh its costs?

Receiving Wide Coverage ... On the Regulatory Horizon: An anonymouse tells the Journal that the forthcoming Volcker Rule won't allow banks to use "portfolio hedging," thanks to JPMorgan Chase's whole "London Whale" debacle. "Regulators, in response to [JPM's disclosure its trades were a hedge], pushed to write a rule that would ensure banks couldn't engage in such trades," the paper reports. "The move will come as a blow to banks, which lobbied regulators to keep language…

Ignoring the effects of loan seller origination, sourcing, and servicing processes in a post-GSE secondary market could generate losses for taxpayers.

Following tectonic shifts in the video rental industry, the very Blockbuster stores that were just yesterday a competitive advantage rather quickly became an albatross. That type of chain of events is one that bankers need to be especially on guard for.

Breaking News This Morning ... Fined: European Union regulators have fined eight financial institutions, including Deutsche Bank, Société Générale, Royal Bank of Scotland, Citigroup and JPMorgan Chase, for colluding in attempts to manipulate key global benchmark interest rates. Penalties total $2.32 billion. Future penalties are possible. Wall Street Journal, Financial Times, New York Times Receiving Wide Coverage ... …

There’s a reason most Americans still like their local banks, even if they detest the megabanks after the financial crisis.

In the end, we will once again have a system that looks suspiciously like Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac redux, with a housing bubble, a mortgage meltdown and a financial crisis.

Most systemically important financial institutions are publicly traded, so they’d have to immediately disclose any orders from the Fed to curb systemic risk. Their securities would get hammered. Thus, Fed supervision is a strong incentive to operate safely.

A Volcker Rule limiting investment in securities used primarily for customer transactions to 10% of the firm’s revenue is simple for banks to understand and easy for regulators to enforce.