Four people in Wichita, Kan., have pleaded guilty to participating in a mortgage fraud that cost lenders more than $221,000.

Lenders continued to face challenges with loan growth in the second quarter as interest rates increased, a Federal Reserve Board report said Wednesday.

Banks in general are paying departing executives less money. But some, including Sterling Bancorp in New York, are still approving multimillion-dollar parachutes.

Machias also agreed to acquire the assets at the six banks, including loans and real estate, and about $75 million of deposits, the companies said when they announced the sale in July.

A U.S. district court has halted a Tampa, Fla.-based operation that promised to help consumers get payday loans. Instead of loans, the defendants used consumers’ personal financial information to debit their bank accounts in increments of $30 without their authorization, the FTC alleged.

The Dodd-Frank Act aimed to make the mortgage market safer by requiring originators to hold onto a portion of the home loans they generate. American Banker Washington bureau chief Rob Blackwell argues that under heavy industry pressure regulators have failed to live up to the spirit of the law and gutted the provision.

The $2.6 billion-asset Community & Southern has agreed to pay $11.80 per common share of Verity, the companies announced Wednesday.

OmniAmerican Bancorp, the Texas lender whose stock has more than doubled since going public in 2010, is exploring a sale, two people with knowledge of the matter said.

Customers tend to "hire smilers." When otherwise comparable alternatives exist, people gravitate toward businesses that make them feel welcomed and appreciated.

John Stumpf, chairman and chief executive of Wells Fargo, wrote an impassioned column for American Banker last week emphasizing the importance of community banks to the national economy and calling for Washington to unburden them from a stifling regulatory regime. Editors discuss why big banks have so much riding on the survival of their smaller rivals.

Republic First Bancorp (FRBK) in Philadelphia has settled a lawsuit for $2 million, which may delay its ability to claim a large deferred-tax allowance.

Steven Antonakes, the long-time acting No. 2 at the CFPB, has now permanently assumed that position.

A new outsourcing model breaks work up into tiny pieces and farms it out to large groups of freelancers, taking advantage of "cognitive surplus."

Mark Severson plans to resign from Chemung Financial in Elmira, N.Y., Sept. 13 to pursue another opportunity, the $1.3 billion-asset company said Tuesday in a regulatory filing. Chemung will begin a search for his successor immediately.

Checking account fees may help banks pad revenue, but a new survey suggests that ATM and overdraft charges can send customers running.

If spun off from firms that rate corporate debt, raters of asset-backed securities would have less incentive to sugarcoat ratings in exchange for the promise of an issuer’s other business.

The ATM Acquirers Alliance is restructuring its organization to accommodate new industry segments and payments technology and has changed its name to Integrated Payments Alliance.

The risk retention requirement was supposed to ensure lenders had "skin in the game" when making mortgages. Instead, regulators appear to have abandoned that concept by crafting an exception so large that most single-family mortgages will be exempted.

Republic Bancorp (RBCAA) in Louisville said it is highly unlikely that it will complete its purchase of H&R Block Bank by the end of this year.

Online lender Western Sky Financial says it has laid off 94 employees on a South Dakota Indian reservation following its decision to suspend operations.