Today's News

GOING WEST First Bank System plans to take U.S. Bancorp's monicker and ditch its own. Page 4 The timing was perfect for attracting analysts' attention; the deal was announced in New York just up the street from their trade group meeting. Page 5 Small banks in the Pacific Northwest seem eager to compete with the new giant. Page 6 WASHINGTON Sen. Alfonse D'Amato threatened to block regulations to expand bank securities powers. Page 2 COMMUNITY BANKING directors at a conference brainstormed about how to keep shareholders happy. Page 3 A Kansas bank hoping to ride the M&A wave is offering to help others find targets or buyers. Page 3 INVESTMENT PRODUCTS Three months after it bought lagging Keystone Investments, First Union says it is turning the fund unit around. Page 7 CREDIT/DEBIT/ATMs A First Data unit created a debit card program to serve employees without bank accounts. Page 10 NYCE will introduce an Internet version of its home banking product at its meeting in May. Page 10 MORTGAGES trying to win community support in its bidding war for Great Western Financial, H.F. Ahmanson unveiled a $70 billion CRA plan. "This is the best commitment ever," said Bob Gnaizda, counsel for the activist Greenlining Coalition. "Our members are rooting" for Ahmanson. Page 9 TECHNOLOGY An upcoming report by the Bits advisory panel argues that banks are ill prepared to deal with new technologies and new forms of competition. Page 12 The IBM-led Integrion group launched a computer instruction standard for home banking to rival the one Microsoft, Intuit, and Checkfree agreed to. Page 13 CORPORATE FINANCE Lucent Technologies is facing an uphill battle in lining up financing for the manufacture of hardware for Sprint Spectrum. Page 21 PNC's capital markets subsidiary plans to apply to the Fed for corporate debt and equity underwriting authorization. Page 21 MARKET MONITOR Bending to bankers' complaints, the Financial Accounting Standards Board has delayed a new derivatives accounting rule. Back page