Today's News

WASHINGTON Congress is on track to greatly expand individual retirement accounts this year. Page 2 INVESTMENT PRODUCTS INSURANCE: State regulators are cracking down on insurance companies that are pushing banks, brokerages, and agents to sell a newfangled and increasingly popular fixed annuity. Page 7 A new survey indicates more bank brokerages are compensating their sales forces in a manner similar to their nonbank counterparts. Page 8 U.S. Trust is rolling along with its expansion plans - having acquired two asset managers over the last month. Page 9 COMMUNITY BANKING A bay-area thrift is plowing ahead with plans to build a national consumer finance business. Page 18 TECHNOLOGY CommerceWave, a California builder of electronic storefronts, set out to take electronic commerce down a notch - in both cost and complexity. Page 16 REGIONAL BANKING Garry J. Scheuring, the former CEO of Midlantic who orchestrated the New Jersey company's sale to PNC in December 1995, will resign at the end of next month. Mr. Scheuring, the most recent member of Midlantic's senior management team to quit PNC, will remain as one of the bank's 22 directors. Page 5 MORTGAGES Four mortgage insurers - PMI Group, CMAC Investment, Amerin, and Triad Guaranty - all posted double-digit earnings gains for 1996. Page 10 Norwest Mortgage named an executive from its parent company chief financial officer and created a new position for his predecessor. Page 10 a small but growing cadre of mortgage bankers is cutting deals directly with Wall Street. The latest entrant: Norwest. Page 11 CREDIT/DEBIT/ATMs Dean Witter, Discover chose Verisign to supply digital authentication technology for credit card payments over the Internet. Page 14 Vital Processing Services entered into a joint venture designed to provide more-complete merchant transaction information to its financial institution clients. Page 15 American Express formed a company in Japan with three other card issuers to expand its merchant network. Page 15 market monitor Gerard Klauer Mattison raised its earnings estimates on Chase Manhattan and reiterated a "buy" rating, arguing that shares were undervalued in comparison to the bank's peers. Page 22

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