Executives of First Internet Bank, Indianapolis, told investors in late January that the bank posted record earnings in 2018, particularly in commercial and consumer loans and its specialty lending areas, including single tenant lease financing, public finance, healthcare finance, and horse trailer and recreational vehicle lending. [Continue]
Iowa First Bancshares Corp., Muscatine, reported mixed results for 2018. The holding company’s net income of $2,311,000 for the year was $87,000 less than in 2017. [Continue]
Chad Hart is an agriculture economist and assistant professor at Iowa State University, Ames. BankBeat columnist Justin Dullum talked to Hart about the mounting effects of trade negotiations on the ag industry and what might be in store for 2019. [Continue]
Non-performing assets, otherwise known and feared as loans that no longer generate income, are baked into every bank’s cake. The best efforts to keep the ratio of NPAs to gross loans as low as possible can meet many outside forces, recession being foremost. In the 10 years since the last recession, has technology been developed to help community banks manage NPAs to keep their ratio as low as possible in good times and bad? [Continue]
Whether criminals are attempting to trick their victim into providing information (personal, account, internal procedures), downloading malware, conducting fraudulent transactions, or allowing physical or cyber access into the bank, social engineering is often the foundation that leads to fraud and other security concerns. [Continue]
When Sarah Howat and her business partner decided to open a Denver brewery in March 2013, they put together a business plan and found a small group of investors made up primarily of friends and family. Their initial target was $250,000, which Howat described as the low end for starting a brewery. Early in 2014, Black Project Spontaneous & Wild Ales was up and running. [Continue]
Aaron Silva is president of Paladin fs, a research firm that gathers data on core services (and other fintech products) and provides a resource for banks looking to comparison shop. Silva calls Paladin’s data a “blue book” for fintech services. This information, among other things, helps banks determine whether breaking a contract with a core provider is financially feasible, which is an increasingly common scenario, Silva told BankBeat.
Q: What are common issues banks are facing when it comes to core service providers?
Aaron Silva: They are learning the core suppliers are not financially guaranteeing any of their system’s performance. For example, if there is a failure, or something happens that causes the bank harm, they can’t go back to their contract and find a credit or some sort of benefit. They will find they have to beg for it — or sue them. Another issue we see is the bank’s rights around termination of the contract. Today these contracts are written as such that if you leave a certain service for any reason — or even a part of the service — you have to pay the entire balance of your contract, anywhere from 50 to 100 percent of it. [Continue]
Richard McShirley has worked for years in the payments field and shared his thoughts on what banks need to be aware of when looking for payment solutions and how the technology behind them is changing. [Continue]
Between affordability, customer comfort and budget-watching, video technology’s time in the sun has arrived for community banks. We present a quick introduction to interactive teller machines. [Continue]
Peoples Bank SB, Munster, Ind., has completed its acquisition of First Personal Bank, Orland Park, Ill. Peoples Bank now stands at $1.1 billion. [Continue]