Today's News

WASHINGTON

House Banking Chairman Jim Leach has asked bankers and insurance agents to justify their objections to his Glass-Steagall bill. He is expected to use the responses to show that the two sides aren't far apart, so a House vote wouldn't be divisive. Page 2

Probably only nine banks would be subject to planned market-risk capital rules, an FDIC official said. Regulators would probably exempt most others that last summer's proposal would have required to reserve against swings in derivatives, securities, and foreign exchange portfolios. Page 4

REGIONAL BANKING

NationsBank, which recently bought Atlanta-based Bank South, plans to sell or close scores of the Georgia branches. But Bank South's 61 supermarket branches won't be among them. Page 6

First Commercial Bank, Taiwan's second-largest financial institution, is planning to open a Southern California retail banking unit. Page 5

MORTGAGES

Legislation that President Clinton signed last week will give Farmer Mac a big boost toward the goal of securitatizing most of its farm mortgages, but investment bankers say there are still hurdles. Page 18 ROBERT NAGEL, credited with a turnaround at PHH Mortgage Services, has been reassigned to head the big affinity lender's consumer finance business. Succeeding him will be the parent company's treasuer and vice president of investor relations. Page 20

COMMUNITY BANKING

A Miami-based bank owned by Ecuadorans says the Federal Reserve erred in classifying it as a foreign bank - a clasification that forced it to drop an acquisition plan. Page 17

With foreign trade booming, community banksacross the country are increasingly turning to their correspondent banks to meet the needs of small businesses with international aspirations. Page 17

CREDIT/DEBIT/ATMs

MasterCard said four Vietnamese banks will soon begin issuing its cards. Page 21

TECHNOLOGY

Peerless Systems has added a Windows-style graphical interface to the core processing software it sells to community banks for use on midrange IBM computers. Page 23

Cybercash is collaborating with a video game company to develop arcade- style games that consumers could play on the Internet and pay electronically for playing. Page 24

INVESTMENT PRODUCTS

How do you pull ahead of competition that has a head start? Barnett's strategy is to eliminate sales loads and offer free financial planning. Page 26

FINANCE

Wilmington Trust stock fell after Salomon Brothers downgraded it from "buy" to "hold." The shares had gone past Salomon's target price. Back page

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