The National Bankers Association's new chairman is considering an alliance with a thrift league and testing the waters outside the United States.
LouisE. Prezeau, the trade group's newly elected chairman, said it will be exploring new areas such as an alliance with the American Savings and Loan League to see what common services and products they can offer members.
He said his goals for his two-year stint include "establishing the association's reputation as an entity widely known and respected for excellence, and building up its political impact."
In that vein, Mr. Prezeau said he will try to increase membership among the group's traditional base of minority-owned and women-owned banks while setting its sights on a more international following.
"Looking into new markets is another area the association hopes to explore, such as the international markets, particularly those of Africa, the Caribbean, Central and Latin America, and Canada," Mr. Prezeau said. "We need to consider new relations in these, markets.
"We as a banking community are representative of the ethnic diversity of our nation as a whole," he added.
"It gives us a competitive edge in markets not well understood or catered to by many of the majority financial institutions."
Mr. Prezeau, who is also president and chief executive officer of City, National Bank of New Jersey, Newark, said he believes the National Bankers Association is a force to be reckoned with because its members survived and even thrived in market environments that can be optimistically characterized as "in a permanent recession mode."
"Our banks continue to profit at marketing in a niche most businesses abandoned long ago," said Mr. Prezeau.
The Washington, D.C.-based association, now in its 67th year, counts among its members 59 of the 103 U.S. banks owned by minorities and women.
Mr. Prezeau said some of the organizational challenges ahead will be strengthening the association's finance and operations, creating additional revenue streams, and developing initiatives to strengthen member banks.
The changes the chairman anticipates include expanding the membership, decreasing dues, and prodding members to become more involved in evaluation of the association's prospective partnerships, coalitions, and products.
"The association will use call reports on new banks to bring in new members and find out what are their specific needs," said Mr. Prezeau.
Dues for the member banks are based-on total assets and range from $2,550 to $15,000. "Our membership [dues] is being reduced 10% on an annual basis," said Mr. Prezeau.
Mr. Prezeau became president and CEO of City National and its parent company, City National Bancshares, in 1989, after the Comptroller's office had clamped a cease-and-desist order on the bank.
Before that, Mr. Prezeau was chief operating officer of Freedom National Bank of New York, a pioneering black-owned institution.
He was acting president in 1987, Freedom's peak earnings year. He had relocated to New Jersey by the time the Harlem-based bank failed in 1990.
Mr. Prezeau has been involved with the National Bankers Association for 17 years, serving the past year as chairman-elect.
"The management at City National Bank has been reorganized and it will give me time to be an active and effective chairman for the association," Mr. Prezeau said.
"I have the support of the board of directors and staff behind me at the bank."
