Finance

The Green Bay bank has seen stable performance since its recent strategy overhaul.

Elevated interest rates, economic uncertainty and financial sector fragility exposed by recent bank failures threaten to stunt lending activity.

The regional bank started making moves to protect deposits last year, which prevented steeper declines during a volatile first quarter, CEO Tim Spence says.

The Dallas-based bank expects some of the recent deposit outflows to return in the future.

Although the Columbus, Ohio-based regional emerged from the recent crisis relatively unscathed, management was still taking steps to shore up its balance sheet, including forgoing stock buybacks to strengthen a key capital metric.

Despite slower new-account growth, the card network had healthy overall sales, loan growth and deposit inflows in the first quarter. The performance gave credence to its ambitions to become a digital banking giant.

The Cleveland-based regional bank said that its net interest income fell 10% — and profits declined by an even larger percentage — as it paid more to retain depositors. Still, CEO Chris Gorman said the company is "well prepared to handle the deposit challenges in front of the market."

The Charlotte, North Carolina, company plans to fold the online consumer lending platform LightStream into its broader consumer business. On top of a recent pullback in bond trading, it may also make further reductions in its mortgage business and occupied real estate.

Paying higher rates to customers should help stem deposit outflows at the Salt Lake City bank. But it's expected to contribute to a projected 7% drop in net interest income during the second quarter.

The card network says it is prepared to act on any new demand created by the recent banking crisis or possible economic downturn even though it reported slower growth in small-merchant card spending in the first quarter.

The Providence, Rhode Island, expects NII to decline 3% for the second consecutive quarter now that it's paying more to prevent a further slide in deposits and tightening lending standards in anticipation of a mild recession.

Reacting to a sharp uptick in charge-offs, Synchrony more than doubled its provision for credit losses during the first quarter to account for further shocks along with healthy loan-portfolio growth as more consumers revolve credit card balances.

During its first-quarter earnings call, the Detroit-based company's CEO said it is seeking to "protect the house" by dialing back the pace of car-loan originations and seeking to attract more super-prime borrowers.

Executives at the Minneapolis bank responded to a research report that highlighted the decline in a key capital ratio after an acquisition last year. They don't plan to raise capital but aim to generate more of it from earnings in coming quarters.

Executives and financial strategists are considering derivatives as a hedge against rising interest rates.

The Phoenix bank provided behind-the-scenes details of the fallout from March's banking crisis, when it lost $8 billion of deposits in a single day. The company's share price closed up 24% on Wednesday after executives vowed to reassess its capital and liquidity strategy.

Wealth management lifted the firm's bottom line, as the unit's revenues rose 11% over the past year and it hauled in assets across multiple channels.

Morgan Stanley's investment bank and its giant wealth unit surpassed analysts' expectations in the first quarter even as profits fell from a year earlier, dragged down by a drop-off in dealmaking and a jump in loan-loss provisions.

The Tennessee bank confirmed in its earnings report that the deal, already delayed by several months amid heightened regulatory scrutiny, likely would not close by a May 27 deadline. No new target date has been set.

After seeing deposit increase over the second half of March, CFO Dermot McDonogh restated the New York custody giant's guidance for a 20% year-over-year jump in spread income, hinting the company might actually overshoot its target.