Top Story Lending Related

The NCUA is hosting its third and final round for credit unions to qualify to use the streamlined application for certification as community development financial institutions, from August 7 through September 1.

The U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD) has announced it is making $38 million available to fight housing discrimination through the Department’s Fair Housing Initiatives Program (FHIP). The grants offered through three FHIP funding notices will support a variety of critical fair housing activities, including fair housing testing in the rental and sales market, public education efforts, capacity building, and education and outreach activities.

A joint release yesterday by the Federal Reserve Board, Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation and the Office of the Comptroller of the Currency reports that risk in the portfolio of large syndicated bank loans declined slightly but remains elevated, according to the Shared National Credit (SNC) Program Review released by the agencies. The high level of credit risk in the SNC portfolio stems primarily from distressed borrowers in the oil and gas (O&G) sector and other industry sector borrowers exhibiting excessive leverage. The review also found that credit risk management practices at most large agent banks continued to improve, consistent with the 2013 Interagency Guidance on Leveraged Lending.

The Office of the Comptroller of the Currency has released a list of 26 Community Reinvestment Act (CRA) performance evaluations received by national banks, federal savings associations, and insured federal branches of foreign banks that became public in July. Three institutions were rated outstanding, and 23 were rated satisfactory.

The Federal Reserve Board has updated its E.2 Terms of Business Lending data with information from a May 1–5 survey of all commercial banks.

U.S. Housing and Urban Development (HUD) Secretary Ben Carson announced yesterday an additional $178.5 million to help hard-hit areas in Florida, North and South Carolina, Texas and West Virginia recover from severe flooding that occurred in 2015 and 2016. The grants are provided through HUD’s Community Development Block Grant – Disaster Recovery (CDBG-DR) Program. Combined with CDBG-DR grants already allocated, HUD’s investment to these areas totals nearly $947 million.

The Office of the Comptroller of the Currency will host two workshops in Baltimore on September 12-13, for directors of financial institutions supervised by the OCC. The Compliance Risk workshop on September 12 focuses on the critical elements of an effective compliance risk management program. The Operational Risk workshop on September 13 focuses on the key components of operational risk—people, processes, and systems.

The OCC has issued a statement by Acting Comptroller of the Currency Keith Noreika regarding the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau’s (CFPB) final rule on arbitration agreements. He expressed concerns that the rule may adversely affect the institutions within the federal banking system and their customers. He said that the rule "may have unintended consequences for banking customers in the form of decreased availability of products and services, increased related costs, fewer options to remedy consumer concerns, and delayed resolution of consumer issues."

Noreika expressed his hope that Congress will use its Congressional Review Act authority "to preserve effective alternatives for consumers to resolve their disputes without lengthy and costly litigation and to reduce the 'piling on' of legal and regulatory burden" that Noreika discussed in his June 22, 2017, testimony before the U.S. Senate Committee on Banking, Housing, and Urban Affairs.

The Federal Reserve Board has released the July 2017 Senior Loan Officer Opinion Survey on Bank Lending Practices, which addresses changes in the standards and terms on, and demand for, bank loans to business and households over the past three months. Responses from 76 domestic banks and 22 U.S. branches and agencies of foreign banks were included.

Regarding loans to businesses, the July survey results indicated that, on balance, demand for commercial and industrial (C&I) loans weakened over the second quarter of 2017 while banks left their standards on C&I loans basically unchanged. Survey respondents also reported that standards on commercial real estate (CRE) loans tightened while demand weakened on net.

The Federal Trade Commission, state, and local authorities will convene the Protecting Military Consumers: A Common Ground Conference in Los Angeles on September 7, 2017, to help educate military consumers and train military attorneys, law enforcement personnel, and consumer protection officials to address consumer fraud and other issues that affect servicemembers and their families. The conference will discuss current and emerging issues affecting servicemembers and their families such as student loans and for-profit colleges, identity theft, imposter scams, debt collections, mortgage disputes and real estate fraud.