BankThink

Margins are slim. Delinquencies are up. Profitability is down. And we're all wondering when the next shoe will drop.

Perhaps it's time to get a whole lot more enthusiastic about plastic.

If one investor gets his way, the tradition of preferring general corporate know-how over specific sector expertise could take a blow. And in this case the turn of fashion may herald a major shakeup in the credit card business.

Bloggers were buzzing today after a report led some to believe that banks were lobbying for the ability to buy their own assets in the Federal Deposit Insurance Corp.´s Public Private Investment Partnership program.

The task seems simple enough, but how often do discussions about underbanked consumers begin by answering the question of who the underbanked really are? Banks have long pursued business from customers who currently do more with check cashing stores and payday lenders than with depository institutions. But lumping these potential customers into a single group may be detrimental to the effort, a new report from the Aite Group suggests.

There´s another set of rankings out: the best places to work in the federal government in 2009. The results, unlike the rankings for top lobbyists, are somewhat surprising. For instance, how did the Treasury Department come to be deemed the sixth best place to find a good work/life balance?

It may have been a rough year for banks and other financial firms, but their lobbyists still seem to be winning. Throughout the month of May, The Hill newspaper has been publishing lists of the top Washington lobbyists, and there are some familiar faces among the crowd.

The Treasury Department has been promising new details on its regulatory restructuring agenda all month, and time is running out. Will an announcement come this week? We've heard the answer is no. Washington will have to keep waiting for a fresh component of Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner's plan, along with rules about executive compensation limits--a release that is even longer overdue.

Banks and regulators have one good reason to celebrate the decline in newspaper readership, but it doesn´t have much to do with journalism. A company that deals collector´s coins took out a full page advertisement in the Washington Post on Thursday touting the merits of armored safes. Mock news articles on the ad page warned of the dangers of depository institutions.

I have to say Matt Blumenfeld has written an excellent article, "Will Third Time Be Unlucky Charm for Overdraft Reform" (CU Journal, May 11). I am especially gratified that Credit Union Journal has given balanced treatment to a controversial subject.