Our bank's CEO and CFO are meeting this week with the state's commissioner about the possibility of converting our national charter into a state charter. Are there any specific benefits to this type of conversion? I have seen posted some of the differences between the OCC and the FDIC regarding CRA and other regs, but my concern was anticipating all of the differences at the state level.

I know of some financial institutions that have converted from state bank charters to state savings bank charters because of the impression that the relationship would be more congenial. But this is anecdotal at best. And this occured in the mid-90's, so take my commments with a grain of salt.

The main issue seems to be one of expense and quicker response time. There is also a question of the impression that the FDIC is more lenient on certain exam areas, such as Fair Lending and CRA.

Additionally, you might take a look at the comments in the CRA forum on the thread discussing tougher compliance.