John Reosti

The NCUA is considering a plan that would let credit unions count certain forms of debt as capital. The plan, which would help credit unions book more loans, is drawing sharp rebukes from the banking industry.

Access National's four-year-old wealth management subsidiary has grown rapidly and is poised to enter the black. The allure of fee revenues has drawn many community banks into this field amid weak loan growth and tight interest margins.

The NCUA is proposing changes that would allow credit unions to approve applications more expeditiously, eliminating an edge long held by banks. The agency is also ready to let members make more commercial development loans.

In what would be the first comprehensive rewrite of its member business lending regulation since 2003, the NCUA Board unanimously approved a proposed series of changes that would make it markedly easier for CUs to lend to businesses.

Members of St. James Federal Savings and Loan Association will meet Saturday to vote on whether to convert from a mutual to a stock-owned bank as a prelude to selling itself to Wells Financial. Some believe the vote could set a worrisome precedent.

Worth Carter is reluctant to talk to investors and media. He is tight-fisted with costs and is willing to hold off making loans. His namesake bank doesn't offer online banking. But the institution is riding a hot streak of profitability that would make other banks jealous.

Bankers scratching their heads about how to attract millennials can take some comfort knowing that generations ago their predecessors also struggled to connect with America's youth. Crocker National Bank found a way, though.

Eastern Bank is considering a plan that would boost its biggest donations from $50,000 to seven-figure sums. While the plan could shrink the total number of grants given, it should also allow the organization to have more influence in certain areas.

With more than 1,300 U.S. branches and a Canadian parent company, TD Bank hardly qualifies as a community bank. But the institution is trying to underscore its local-bank bona fides with marketing campaigns touting its support of neighborhood causes.

A growing number of banks employ chief marketing officers who manage multimillion-dollar budgets and are involved in high-level corporate decision-making. The pressure's on to come up with creative ways to differentiate their brands and connect with customers.

Aside from shoestring budgets, the biggest problem for many community banks is that their marketing programs have gone stale, experts say. For too many, marketing remains bounded by three time-worn pillars: advertising, direct mail and public relations.

An obscure provision in the regulatory relief bill championed by Sen. Richard Shelby, R-Ala., is giving mutual holding companies hope that a threat to their business model will be eliminated.

ALEXANDRIA, Va. — NCUA's Temporary Corporate Credit Union Stabilization Fund continues to improve, and if the current trend holds, credit unions can expect a nice payout — but not for another six years.

Triumph Bancshares in Memphis says it has been mistakenly contacted by customers of Triumph Bancorp in Dallas, and has concluded that the Triumph moniker isn't big enough for both institutions. It's hoping a lawsuit will force the Texas bank to change its name.

NCUA officials still have several more months of work ahead of them before they unveil a comprehensive overhaul of their Field of Membership rules, but the agency completed a kind of trial run Thursday, approving a much narrower amendment to the rules governing associational common bonds.

NCUA is poised to address associational common bonds, a prelude to its reinterpretation of field of membership, at its monthly board meeting Thursday morning. The move comes just days after receiving a new record number of comment letters on risk-based capital. The difference, credit unions are actually looking forward to the FOM proposal, while comments filed on RBC remained largely negative, ranging from calls to can the proposal entirely to revising the already-much-revised rule.

Royal Bancshares in Narberth, Pa., could have taken large writedowns and burned through capital to erase millions of dollars in bad assets. But management decided to hold onto those assets as it slowly ran off loans in a pair of shuttered business lines.

Banks in Baltimore seem to have avoided the worst of the violence in the city's riots, though that's partly because they have few branches in some of the affected neighborhoods.

The Pennsylvania company is keen on buying a bank with $1 billion or more in assets to soundly cross a threshold that would bring with it more regulatory scrutiny.

The company will consider annual elections for all directors after investors passed a non-binding resolution urging for a change.