PayThink

Banks have been granted more time to comply with new restrictions on swaps activities by the Office of the Comptroller of the Currency.

The bank should have recognized that the borrower's conditions had changed, and so should the conditions of the credit change, accordingly.

Small banks continue to rake in revenue from interchange fees on debit cards, despite fears that the Durbin amendment would hurt them as much as larger institutions, according to a report released by the Federal Trade Commission.

Chairmen of the House Financial Services Committee requested to postpone the Volcker Rule until 2015 only three weeks after U.S. regulators said they would delay the Jan. 1 start date for new capital requirements.

Securitization is essentially a financial production factory. Consistency in the manufacturing process, which minimizes defects and hence promotes investor interest in the product, would allow the business to prosper again.

Have you ever caught yourself paying a $3 ATM fee to avoid driving across town? Add up the value of your time, gasoline costs, the need to complete a necessary task and it's easy to justify that $3.

The Congressional agenda for 2013 will include lawmakers overseeing implementation of the Dodd-Frank Act and possible advances on housing finance reform.

The Consumer Financial Protection Bureau finalized its first rule, took its first enforcement actions, and landed its first deals with state regulators and municipalities to enhance data sharing all during the agency's first year. The CFPB's most challenging work, however, is still to come.

Rep. Barney Frank opened up with American Banker's Rob Blackwell in a 2012 interview, discussing what motivated him to get into politics, his personal life, and the cause of political gridlock in Congress.

"With a divided Congress slow to confirm appointees, only one of the four federal bank regulators had a permanent chief, and the Federal Deposit Insurance Corp. board of directors had just three members. No one on the board was the confirmed head of an agency," writes American Banker's Joe Adler.