PayThink

Recent delays may be frustrating, but the Office of the Comptroller of the Currency isn't closing the door on financial technology companies. However, applicants will have to be patient, forthright about their business plans and willing to actively engage any state or federal regulatory agencies that the OCC consults.

Fiscal restraint, the reversal of enormous amounts of monetary stimulus, smarter regulation and job retraining are among the public policy steps that could interrupt the long U.S. tradition of boom-and-bust cycles.

Though the Paycheck Protection Program is winding down, the Small Business Administration has prolonged several other pandemic relief programs. Community banks can help local businesses sort through their options.

As attitudes about corporate responsibility evolve, regulators will expect banks to take a more proactive approach to environmental, social and governance issues. That means going beyond assessing climate-related risks to incorporate a focus on ethics, culture, inclusion and customer protection.

The issues associated with environmental, social and governance policies cut across all the traditional concepts of risk facing bank executives and will endure for years.

Tens of millions of consumers diligently pay their rent, utilities and other bills every month yet have no credit history. Supplementing traditional credit scoring with such data will promote equity and upward economic mobility, says the CEO of Experian North America.

Alternative branches were long criticized for generating fewer deposits than traditional ones. But in an increasingly online world, convenient and conspicuous physical presences at places like grocery stores stand out.

The government helped the gas pipeline operator recoup some of the funds it paid to cyberthieves, but that's unlikely to happen often. Banks should shore up password security to minimize risk and be willing to reject hackers' demands in the event of a breach.

The federal government is developing plans to require public companies to notify investors of climate and other environmental, social and governance-related risks. Lenders must take steps to understand the underlying issues and ensure borrowers disclose their own ESG exposures.

Policymakers need to stop attacking credit bureaus and take action against credit repair firms that use dubious tactics to wipe bad debt from consumers' credit reports. Such schemes both impair banks' ability to accurately underwrite loans and further hurt real victims of identity theft.