Analysts are using words like “tough” and “lackluster” to describe community banks’ second-quarter earnings, but they expect that rising interest rates and an expanding economy will lead to an upturn sometime this year or in early 2005.

After years of limited expansion BankUnited Financial Corp. of Coral Gables, Fla., has opened four branches in nine months and hopes to keep up the pace into next year.

Commercial Capital Bancorp Inc. of Irvine, Calif., said Monday that second-quarter earnings more than doubled because of continued record originations of apartment loans throughout the state.

Capitol Federal Financial of Topeka, Kan., has refinanced $2.4 billion of its fixed-rate borrowings to boost future earnings.

This has been a busy year for credit unions converting to mutual thrifts, but if the National Credit Union Administration gets its way, the pace of future conversions could slow considerably.

Old National Bancorp’s second-quarter earnings fell 58% from the same quarter last year, to $11.3 million.

Three senators are urging the Treasury Department to let small banks adopt the tax-friendly limited liability company structure.

Four months ago it looked as if First Niagara Financial Group Inc. in Lockport, N.Y., would spend the better part of 2004 in a consolidation mode.

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Rabobank Group, which has gained a considerable share of the U.S. agricultural lending market in recent years by acquiring a small California bank and two Midwest agribusiness lenders, has apparently set its sights on one the largest lenders in the Farm Credit System.

So far this year farmers plagued by the now five-year drought throughout the West and the Great Plains have done a better job paying back their loans than they did last year.

Banks doing business in California are taking the unusual step of endorsing a statewide initiative on the November ballot that they say could help minimize frivolous "shakedown" lawsuits by private lawyers.

Bankers in California are up in arms about proposed legislation that could send bank and credit union employees to jail for failing to report suspected financial abuse of elderly customers to law enforcement officials or the state's Adult Protective Services agency.

For the past four years legislators in Indiana have been debating predatory lending, an issue where federal regulators have proved particularly willing to preempt state laws.

Missouri may soon have the toughest penalty yet for identity thieves - life imprisonment for the most serious offenses.