Jon Prior

The Indiana bank announced a five-year, $8.3 billion agreement with the National Community Reinvestment Coalition in connection with its acquisition of First Midwest Bancorp. The Federal Reserve approved the purchase last month.

Underwriting has become more lenient amid increased competition for corporate borrowers, and as Paycheck Protection Program loans are disappearing from banks' balance sheets.

Overdraft fees have been a reliable revenue source for decades, but the charges have fallen into disfavor amid regulatory scrutiny and competition from neobanks. Here's a look at the steps various large and midsize banks are taking to reduce or eliminate the fees, as well as their plans for what's next.

Executives said record-high commercial loan commitments in the fourth quarter validate the San Antonio bank’s decision to open more than two dozen branches in Houston and pursue a similar path in Dallas.

Cash is being used in fewer transactions than ever before, and the pandemic has only accelerated the trend. Yet the U.S. is far behind some European and Asian countries in embracing digital payments and significant hurdles remain to its becoming completely cashless.

After regulators signaled their intention to crack down on banks that lean on the controversial charges, First National Bank Texas adopted a reform. A bank spokesperson said the move was unrelated to any pressure from Washington.

A $28 billion agreement with the National Community Reinvestment Coalition could help win regulatory approval for the acquisition of Michigan-based Flagstar Bancorp. The deal was originally expected to close last year.

The Alabama company continues to explore buyouts of add-on businesses, part of a strategy that has already helped recoup dollars lost as a result of reforms to its overdraft practices.

The largest bank based in oil-rich Texas is building a framework for gauging the threat that climate change poses to its business and plans to disclose more information on the subject this summer. Meanwhile, its energy loan portfolio shrank 24% year over year.

An uptick in commercial borrowers’ credit line utilization rates bodes well for loan growth in 2022, PNC Financial Services Group CEO William Demchak said Tuesday.

Shares fell sharply Friday after the company said spending increased 14% in the fourth quarter and will climb by another 8% in 2022. But CEO Jamie Dimon said the investments in marketing, technology and talent are necessary to ward off threats from traditional banks and upstart fintechs.

The Conference of State Bank Supervisors abandoned a lawsuit against the Office of the Comptroller of the Currency that had challenged the San Francisco fintech's effort to become a national bank without deposit insurance. The company recently amended its application to drop that controversial element.

Business inventories, a key indicator of potential loan demand, are expected to swing upward this year as supply chain bottlenecks finally crack open, according to a panel of economists.

Cryptocurrency kiosks are increasingly suspected of being used in the smuggling of human beings and drugs. Law enforcement agencies need more information about their locations, according to a government watchdog report.

The $3 billion-asset company is expecting to add seven branches in the northwestern part of the state, and to expand its commercial lending business in the Toledo market, with the acquisition of Comunibanc Corp.

The largest U.S. bank by assets is declining to institute a companywide mandate like Citigroup and is instead tailoring its rules to local requirements.

Sarah Bloom Raskin, reportedly the Biden administration's top candidate for vice chair of supervision, would toughen the Federal Reserve's stances on the role of banks in combating climate change, capital requirements, the Volcker Rule and other policy areas, experts say.

The state Department of Financial Protection and Innovation issued a cease-and-desist order against Nano Banc, saying the troubled bank violated an earlier consent agreement when it replaced five board members and appointed a new CEO without the regulator’s permission.

Darryl White has made no secret of the Canadian company’s intentions to expand its U.S. presence, and the deal for San Francisco-based Bank of the West would give it a foothold in the nation’s largest and richest state.

One of the largest M&A agreements of the year occurs as policymakers are locked in a fight over whether to toughen scrutiny of big-bank mergers and acquisitions.