Banco Popular de Puerto Rico

Receiving Wide Coverage ...Banished: The U.K.'s Financial Services Authority has banned former head of corporate lending at HBOS Peter Cummings from working in the country's financial services industry for his role in the bank's collapse during the 2008 financial crisis. Cummings was also fined £500,000 ($805,000), which the Journal notes is "the highest fine imposed by the FSA on a senior executive for management failings." The FSA imposed the penalties because it believes Cummings "pursued an aggressive expansion of HBOS's lending practices, which led to major losses," the Times reports. HBOS was ultimately purchased by Lloyds TBS as a part of a rescue takeover in 2008 and the merged banks received a big bailout from the British government shortly thereafter.

Receiving Wide Coverage ...QE3 Forever?: The Federal Reserve Thursday outlined its latest plan to spur job growth and bolster the economy. The basic steps include the purchase of $85 billion in long-term bonds a month through the rest of the year, the subsequent addition of $40 billion of mortgage-backed debt per month until the job market gets better and low interest rates through at least mid-2015. Stocks rallied following the announcement of this indefinite QE3, as traders apparently had been sufficiently encouraged to buy "growth-sensitive assets," reports the FT.

Receiving Wide Coverage ...QE3,the Weekend After: The analysis of whether the Federal Reserve's latest round of quantitative easing is likely to accomplish anything continues. The Journal suggests big bank stocks will get a boost from Fed chairman Ben Bernanke's big move since it will increase lending and bank-revenue growth. It's also likely to underpin "the nascent housing recovery" and "extend the recent refinancing wave that has lifted mortgage revenue at a host of banks." But, according to the FT, the Fed's plan isn't likely to have an immediate effect on the larger economy since many banks are struggling to process back-logged mortgage applications, which could keep "rates on home loans elevated." And this Times article suggests banks may not be encouraged to push mortgage rates down as low as they could go since "by keeping the rates elevated, they are able to earn much larger profits when they sell the mortgages into the bond market." The collective assessment sounds an awful lot like the criticism of government stimulus efforts we've heard before: good for big banks on Wall Street, of little help to those on Main Street.

Receiving Wide Coverage ...Mobile Payments: Jack Dorsey's Square closed on a $200 million financing round that the papers say values the mobile-payments company at about $3.25 billion. The Journal's "Heard on the Street" column uses the occasion to offer a succinct overview of the disruptive implications of mobile payments technologies. Not only are the makers of cash registers and swipe terminals threatened (Nordstrom, for example, plans to go "completely mobile" in its department stores), so are merchants themselves to some extent, the column notes. That's because Square and other mobile app makers stand to acquire a wealth of valuable data about customer spending habits - information that merchants would prefer to control themselves. Wall Street Journal, New York Times, Financial Times

Receiving Wide Coverage ...Goldman CFO to Retire: David Viniar, who has served as Goldman Sachs' chief financial officer since its 1999 IPO, plans to retire in January and take a "non-independent" seat on the board. The 57-year-old will be succeeded by Harvey Schwartz, nine years his junior, in what the Journal describes as Goldman's "first nod to a group of younger leaders." In another Journal story, analyst Meredith Whitney is quoted interpreting Viniar's retirement as a "signal that relative calm has arrived" for Goldman. "Viniar has wanted to retire for years," Whitney says, "but because he was seen as such a source of stability for the firm and so trusted by the analyst and investor community, coupled with the increased scrutiny for the industry and particularly Goldman," the company loyalist couldn't bring himself to leave until now. (The wags at DealBreaker like to refer to Viniar by his nickname "Bones," which, at least in this context, appears to be a reference to Star Trek's trusty Dr. McCoy.) The FT notes that Schwartz will inherit an "unusually broad portfolio": In addition to the usual duties of a CFO, Viniar also oversees risk management, regulation and technology. And as the overseer of risk, Viniar signed off on Goldman's highly profitable bet against mortgage credit during the throes of the crisis, another FT story points out. Schwartz's background — he was the co-head of the securities division, and earlier the head of sales for that division — is "more salesy than treasury-y," writes DealBreaker's Matt Levine. Additional coverage in the New York Times

Wall Street JournalBank of America is accelerating its job cuts, aiming to trim 16,000 positions by the end of the year, according to a front-page story in the paper.

Wall Street JournalIf you want to catch up on FinCen's proposed expansion of anti-money laundering and know-your-customer requirements, which was released for public comment in February, the Journal offers a primer today. The gist is that "Treasury wants financial institutions to understand who owns or controls an account and keep detailed records that law-enforcement officials can access." While regulators have wanted banks to identify beneficial owners of accounts for years, the rule would codify this expectation. And not just for banks: Securities and commodities brokers and mutual funds would also have to identify beneficial ownership, and FinCen might extend the rule to mortgage lenders, casinos and even gemstone dealers. The Journal quotes an ABA official summing up why banks are wary of this plan: "You don't want to deputize bankers as junior G-men. … We're not good at it." Come to think of it, that pretty much sums up the trouble with AML laws in general. FinCen's holding a hearing on the proposal in Chicago next week.

Receiving Wide Coverage ...The Fed Dissected: It's been well over a week since the Federal Reserve announced another round of (this time unlimited) quantitative easing, but the U.S. central bank is still making headlines. The Journal has two stories this morning dissecting Federal Reserve Governor Daniel Tarullo's schedule. Their major takeaways include that Tarullo, considered the Fed's top banking regulator, spends a lot of time talking "with Obama administration figures, U.S. regulators and foreign officials" in an attempt to coordinate the massive regulatory overhaul taking place worldwide. He also made plenty of time for bankers, having "met in person or talked on the phone more than 60 times during one recent year with top U.S. bank executives" or, as the paper, alternately puts it, "five times more often" than Fed Chairman Ben Bernanke did. Tarullo spoke most often with Morgan Stanley Chief Financial Officer Ruth Porat, who has a role in organizing meetings between big-bank financial chiefs and the regulator. He also met periodically with Bank of America chief Brian Moynihan, Goldman Sachs head Lloyd Blankfein, JPMorgan Chase boss James Dimon and Citigroup leader Vikram Pandit, though the Fed is declining to comment on what any of these meetings were actually about.

Receiving Wide Coverage ...Global Threat on the Horizon: The central banks' efforts are all well and good, but the U.S. and European governments will need to do more to prevent global growth from screeching to a halt, says International Monetary Fund managing director Christine Lagarde. In an address at the Peterson Institute for International Economics, Lagarde warned the IMF may cut its estimates of global growth again this year during its meetings in Japan next month. She urged the U.S. to put aside political wrangling in order to address its deficit, calling the widening debt ceiling and uncertainty over the fiscal cliff "a threat for the global economy." , Washington PostNew York Times

Receiving Wide Coverage ...Libor Shuffle: We suspected Libor was going to be big news this week. Following CFTC chairman Gary Gensler's call for radical reform of the Libor system, reports surfaced that the British Bankers' Association has voted to give control of the benchmark interest rate — which the BBA itself created back in 1986 — to someone else. The trade association's vote, which took place earlier this month, precedes the formal recommendations from U.K. Financial Services Authority managing director Martin Wheatley expected to be unveiled on Friday. The Times says the group's potential removal is "a blow to the organization," while the FT's Jonathan Guthrie calls the BBA's decision "the decent thing" to do. His op-ed, however, also points out that the trade association should have stepped down much sooner and equates the move to "an old-fashioned army suicide" preceding a dishonorable discharge at the hands of Wheatley. "The pre-emptive move amounts to banks telling customers: 'We can't be trusted,'" Guthrie writes, while adding that a switch in oversight may not preclude more scandals from popping up since "regulation and Whack a Mole have much in common."