BankThink

How can you make sure your credit card program grabs its share of the holiday haul?

Henry Wirz, CEO of SAFE Credit Union, shares five more best practices his credit union has developed.

A bankers' association could set up a panel charged with the responsibility of reviewing every claim made against a member and determining whether it had merit.

Receiving Wide Coverage ...UBS Nears Libor Deal: UBS is expected to reach a settlement with U.K. and U.S. authorities over its involvement in the London interbank offered rate-rigging scandal by the end of this year, several news outlets are reporting this morning. Even more notable is the fact that this settlement is expected to supersede the $450 million Barclays agreed to pay over similar charges. (A unnamed FT source "close to the talks" estimates the fine is likely to be higher than $500 million.) UBS acknowledged that talks are underway, but declined to comment on the specifics. Should it pan out, a large settlement "would increase the likelihood that other financial institutions would face stiff penalties," the New York Times' Dealbook reports. The Royal Bank of Scotland is also apparently in "advanced talks" with regulators, though a resolution is less imminent. Financial Times, New York Times, Wall Street Journal

Why does an industry so often criticized for charging high fees to low-income consumers think it can win over critics by adding members of the 1% to the payroll?

A bill to merge the Securities and Exchange Commission and the Commodity Futures Trading Commission has been introduced by Reps. Barney Frank and Mike Capuano.

This newly discovered, expanded version of Aesop's most famous fable bears an eerie resemblance to the modern day and sheds new light on its tragic moral.

Receiving Wide Coverage ...Mortgage Morass, Continued: Bankers can be forgiven for mistaking the mortgage cops for a pack of raving hyenas that just won't end its pursuit. In the latest twist, the Justice Department argued Wednesday that the $25 billion mortgage settlement finalized earlier this year between the federal and state governments on one side and five big banks on the other doesn't buy Wells Fargo (WFC) immunity from being sued by the feds yet again over mortgage foreclosure practices, Bloomberg reports. Wells had earlier declared that it no longer regards itself as liable for the claims — a view DOJ lawyers termed "flatly inconsistent" with the terms of the earlier settlement. The current case, in a New York federal court, is premised on accusations that Wells officials originated loans insured by the Federal Housing Administration that they knew failed to meet its requirements and resulted in "substantial losses," says Bloomberg. The DOJ submitted its claims to U.S. District Judge Rosemary Collyer, who earlier this year approved the $25 billion pact. In another sign that that deal has done little to end the stream of mortgage-related lawsuits, another federal judge earlier this week ruled that the Federal Housing Finance Agency may proceed with cases charging Bank of America (BAC), Citigroup (NYSE: C), HSBC and Credit Suisse (CS) of wrongdoing in the sale of securities backed by residential mortgages. Bloomberg, Reuters, American Banker

Banks today are struggling to pull together complaints data from multiple sources for analysis, resolution and reporting. There is also the challenge of interacting with customers, especially when something goes wrong.

The average credit union is billions of dollars smaller than the behemoth banks. And the overall quality of credit union business loans is much higher than that of bank commercial loans.