Harry Terris

Large banks have been relatively inactive in the market for targets with less than $2 billion of assets, once a staple.

Cost consciousness appears to have an echo in the way banks are configuring their branch networks: the typical office holds more deposits than it used to.

Home equity lending remains miles away from growth, despite anecdotal evidence of a comeback and rising real estate prices that are fortifying loans already on the books.

Recovering home prices have helped shrink underwater home equity loans, but such uncollateralized assets are still large when measured against Tier 1 common equity at the Big Four banks.

Credit card delinquencies rose in January, but chargeoffs fell and portfolios appear likely to extend a streak of strong performance in the months ahead.

Growth is hard to come by in the credit card business, but major lenders are sticking with a smaller pool of customers with higher credit scores.

Growth is hard to come by in the credit card business, but major lenders are sticking with a smaller pool of customers with higher credit scores.

Banks have nearly picked the last of the low-hanging earnings fruit.

Net interest margins continued to come under pressure in the fourth quarter. Net interest income, aided by loan growth, held up better.

The banking industry's appetite for municipal debt has been on the rise, but it's mostly small institutions that are doing the splurging, leaving the typical small bank with a far bigger allocation to munis then the typical large bank.

The drain from construction loan portfolios has slowed, and other categories of commercial property loans have notched gains in recent periods.

Receiving Wide Coverage ...Economy Contracts: Private-sector demand was strong, but businesses reined in inventories and defense spending plummeted, leading to a surprise 0.1% contraction in economic activity in the fourth quarter, according to the Commerce Department's first estimate. The Journal said analysts pinned the plunge in military spending on factors like the drawdown in Afghanistan and worries that more reductions are coming. The Post said government agencies "began adopting contingency plans, instituted hiring freezes and delayed projects in anticipation" of automatic cuts under the sequester. Markets appeared to take the outturn in stride, as the S&P 500 closed down by just 0.39%. Wall Street Journal, New York Times, Washington Post

Mortgage earnings climbed to 14% of total revenues at Wells Fargo in the fourth quarter. Banks say they can scale down operations quickly when volume fizzles.

Some of the nation's biggest lenders said that savings from firing consultants doing foreclosure reviews would largely cancel out the cost of direct compensation to borrowers.

Breaking News This Morning ...Earnings: SunTrust, Morgan Stanley, General Electric

Credit card delinquencies fell across the board at the Big Six issuers in December, reversing the deterioration during the fall.

Unlimited TAG insurance of noninterest-bearing deposits ended with 2012. Any shifting of cash from banks to money market funds has been modest so far.

Business borrowing from commercial banks appears to have jumped at an annual rate of 11% in the fourth quarter, reversing two quarters of fading momentum.

Large numbers of yield-hungry banks have gorged on municipal bonds, and the industry’s overall holdings of the paper have edged up.

Deposits in accounts temporarily protected by unlimited insurance represented more than 10% of assets at more than 900 banks at Sept. 30