BankThink

Receiving Wide Coverage ...Moynihan's Big Payday: Brian Moynihan got a big raise in 2012. According to a regulatory filing (and one person "familiar with the matter" who was kind enough to fill in some gaps), the Bank of America CEO's overall pay package totaled $12 million. This includes a $950,000 salary and $11.1 million in restricted shares, which, together represent a 70% increase over his pay in 2011 and the "largest since he took over the Charlotte, N.C., company in 2010." The raise is related to "an improved performance" last year as B of A's shares advanced 109% and net profit jumped by 189%. If you're wondering where Moynihan, "the lowest-paid chief executive among the six giant U.S. banks and securities firms" in 2011, now falls on the executive pay scale, the raise puts him ahead of JPMorgan Chase's Jamie Dimon — who, recall, got Whaled in 2012 — and Morgan Stanley's James Gorman, who also took a pay cut this year. He will still make less, however, than Goldman Sachs' Lloyd Blankfein and Wells Fargo's John Stumpf. Financial Times, Wall Street Journal

Bankers, analysts and investors can no longer simply consider past performance to gauge if banks have enough capital. The what-if forecasting of regulators' stress tests is critical to the exercise.

Many banks have marketing savvy, but few effectively convert prospects into good customers. Gather sample data tracking your new-prospect encounters to see where and how you fail. Survival requires selling.

Wall Street JournalFourth time's a charm? The paper reports "deficit hawks" Alan Simpson and Erskine Bowles plan to offer up a deficit fix to Washington sometime later today. According to the duo, this new plan "would reduce the federal budget deficit by $2.4 trillion over 10 years" primarily through reductions to Medicare and Medicaid, curbing or axing certain tax breaks, lowering caps on discretionary spending and adjusting how cost-of-living increases are calculated for Social Security checks. Of course, Simpson and Bowles' prior attempts to solve the nation's fiscal woes, including as co-chairs of a White House panel in 2010 "fell flat." The article attributes this to their pitches being "more popular with rank-and-file members looking to support a bipartisan plan than with congressional leaders ... locked in negotiations."

CUNA is just a week away from hosting approximately 4,000 people at its annual Governmental Affairs Conference, where there will be lots of talk about government and likely a few affairs.

Sageworks' Vimal Patel tells you what you can do to prepare for the new FASB ALLL rules.

The nature of mergers has changed. For the larger, acquiring credit union, there was a time when mergers meant more opportunity, a bigger book of business and growth into a new region.

Revisiting the way banks, credit unions and nonbank lenders operate (and collaborate) will offer choices, protections and a path to greater financial security.

Boosting regulatory oversight of Wall Street firms will better allocate examiner resources to the riskiest financial firms and help reduce unnecessary burdens on community banks.

At a Senate Banking Committee hearing on the implementation of Dodd-Frank, Sen. Elizabeth Warren demanded to know why regulators are not pursuing banks in court.