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Comerica, Citizens Financial and other companies are buying up securities, paying off high-cost borrowing and trying to develop specialty lending niches. But loan growth remains weak, and the likelihood of extreme volatility in deposits makes it hard to plan ahead.

Like other card issuers, the Stamford, Conn., company expects current trends — soft loan demand but strong credit quality — to reverse later this year as the economy emerges from the pandemic-induced recession.

BofA, Chase and Wells Fargo are among the big banks piloting a service to rein in screen scraping; Truist spending $1.8 billion on tech, customer service upgrades; soaring deposits have tied Regions’ hands; and more from this week’s most-read stories.

A rule change that allows farms with just one employee tap the Paycheck Protection Program means more pandemic relief funds are flowing into such states as Nebraska, Oklahoma, Wyoming and North Dakota.

City National Bank is working with the fintech startup Extend to further boost contactless payments at the point of sale for business employees through the launch of a virtual Visa commercial credit card.

Initially created as a budgeting app, Charlie has added new features that help users visualize their debt and then chip away at balances. Eventually it hopes to add more banklike products.

The Indiana company, which had relied on internal processes that focused on large loans, has bought a suite of software tools to begin looking at relationships based on underlying risk.

The credit union regulator's first prohibitions of 2021 relate to misuse of member funds at institutions in Alaska and Florida.

The company wants to join in on the rush to develop stablecoins and central bank digital currencies, in part to show that it can still be a player in cutting-edge technologies after its merger deal with Plaid fell through.

Several financial tech companies that applied to become national banks are seeking exemptions from many provisions of the Community Reinvestment Act. A consumer advocacy group and the American Bankers Association say the OCC mustn't allow this.