Retail & Commercial

Comerica, Citizens Financial and other companies are buying up securities, paying off high-cost borrowing and trying to develop specialty lending niches. But loan growth remains weak, and the likelihood of extreme volatility in deposits makes it hard to plan ahead.

Like other card issuers, the Stamford, Conn., company expects current trends — soft loan demand but strong credit quality — to reverse later this year as the economy emerges from the pandemic-induced recession.

A rule change that allows farms with just one employee tap the Paycheck Protection Program means more pandemic relief funds are flowing into such states as Nebraska, Oklahoma, Wyoming and North Dakota.

The Indiana company, which had relied on internal processes that focused on large loans, has bought a suite of software tools to begin looking at relationships based on underlying risk.

The administration’s initiative to offer universal high-speed internet service is a chance for bankers to provide underserved households with access to online financial education and low-cost digital accounts.

The Atlanta company joins a small list of banks that have sold loans to companies struggling with the coronavirus pandemic.

The credit union expects to open at least eight branches across the country in the months ahead, about half of what it normally adds to its brick-and-mortar network in an average year.

Dave Uejio, acting director of the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau, promised to protect veterans from predatory loans and to crack down on companies that improperly garnish stimulus checks or mistreat struggling borrowers.

Barry Orr, who formed FirstBank & Trust of Texas in the 1990s, continued to run the bank after selling it to Heartland Financial USA in 2018.

The Buffalo, N.Y., bank and Railz are working together to analyze accounting data to provide small firms with fresh insight into the health of their operations.