American Banker recently gathered four panelists — Fred Cannon at KBW Inc., Scott Siefers at Sandler O'Neill & Partners LP, Joe Stilwell at Stilwell Group and Brad Whitman at Barclays Capital — to discuss the year ahead for community banks. This is an excerpt of the wide-ranging discussion.
How are community banks positioned headed into 2012?
SCOTT SIEFERS: I'm afraid it's not getting any easier. On the plus side there's the systemic recapitalization we've seen over the last couple of years, and credit trends continue to improve. Having said that, the smaller you go in the banking space, the more spread-dependent you are and the less diversified your revenue stream is. The smaller banks also tend to have more real estate exposure. Given the flat shape of the yield curve, the fact that the economy isn't progressing nearly as strongly as we would hope, it's going to be a tough environment over the next year at least.
FRED CANNON: For community banks, it's certainly a tough operating environment. The Fed promising to be on hold through 2013 means there's little aspect for relief in interest margins and rates. The credit recovery we've seen is starting to wane … so really it's all about profitability at this point, and that's a tough picture.
Are small banks better off growing or shrinking loans?
JOE STILWELL: As an investor, what you want to make sure happens is that growth doesn't take place for the sake of growth. You're looking for intelligent growth. It's hard right now. I think the Fed's zero interest rate policy is causing a lot of the more creditworthy small businesses to just pay down loans. One of the best things we're seeing is controlled shrinkage, where [banks] are paying off higher-cost liabilities, particularly with some of the borrowings and moving back towards more of a core business.
SIEFERS: One of the big misconceptions about this recovery is that banks are very hesitant to lend. I think in many cases they're quite willing, but there's just not a lot of creditworthy borrowers. On the supply side, it's very difficult to commit capital when you don't know what the rules are going to be. So there are frustrations on the supply and the demand side.
BRAD WHITMAN: As securities are running off and you're trying to replace it with more attractive securities, they're just not out there. How do you find attractive loans? C&I seems to be one place people look. Fee income is another place. But getting that most favorable match for any given institution is tough. It's very hard to see when this is going to free up. Net interest margin compression … looks like it will be the story for the next couple of quarters.
When will deposits start to benefit banks again?
STILWELL: You can still find an awful lot of institutions that have higher-cost borrowings on the balance sheet, which they probably have no business having in the first place, but they were just playing bond market with the securities portfolio. To the extent they're taking deposits in, the sticky deposits will always have a value.
SIEFERS: I'm not aware of any community banks … looking to turn away deposits. It's certainly a real problem for net interest income growth, just to have this excess liquidity with nowhere to go. It is tempting to reach out over your skis from a risk standpoint, given that you are so awash in liquidity. The value will be realized either in a sale or in a more accommodating rate environment. Unfortunately, we might have to wait a while for that rate environment to reveal itself.
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For five very long years and to no avail, our national equipment leasing firm has been attempting to persuade our local Chicago based Community Bank portfolio investors to diversify outside of their headstrong and highly concentrated CRE loans. Less than half these Community Bankers heeded our advice to diversify outside of CRE. We even offered them direct access to discount our viable and healthy conduit of solid credit and collateral equipment leases. Most of them ignored our advice and shunned both C&I lending and our sincere and legitimate offers to discount our commercial equipment leases. Many of those bankers who ignored our advice have either failed or remain on the verge of failure from their struggling CRE concentrations.
Scott Siefers claims "there's just not alot of creditworthy borrowers" right now. I respectfully disagree particularly if the definition of "creditworthy" is a reasonable definition as it relates to a borrower's ability to pay. Here is where we, (as an independent finance company), differ with our Community Bank brethren. We have found that many undercapitalized Community Bankers are unreasonably raising the bar on their definition of "creditworthy" far beyond any fair and reasonable standard. We sympathize with the uncertainty created by egregious, over-regulation and the useless Dodd-Frank. The uncertainty created by Dodd-Frank and overreaching but well intended regulators will not stop. However, that does not mean that bankers cannot push back in the form of a strong argument to diversify outside of CRE, particularly with our very healthy and solvent independent equipment leasing industry. The fear and uncertainty madness has to stop if we are to recover as an economy particularly since any U.S. recovery is entirely dependent upon small business job creation from our local communities and our local Community Banks.
Community Bankers need to take a hard look at outsourcing the origination and servicing of non-CRE business, even if it is temporary in nature. Once they have the capital and necessary portfolio experience with non-CRE loans and leases, they can then look to bring that business in house by partnering with healthy independents. Until our critically important Community Bankers take a more reasonable and unconventional approach to fund small businesses in our communities, we simply will not recover from this brutal banking and jobs crisis.
Best Regards,
Dale R. Kluga
President
Cobra Capital LLC
2831 W. 83rd Street
Darien, Illinois 60561
630-675-0828 Cell
630-985-3500 Office
www.cobrallc.com
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