The Banker Next Door

The Banker Next Door (BND) weekly live stream show. Strategy Room provides financial news, commentary, top stories in the business world, economic indicators, and all things banking for the week.

This episode examines a blog post from PCBB titled “Benefits of digital lending keep growing, along with loan volume.” The market for small business loans continues to grow. A digital lending platform can provide borrowers with the convenience of applying for loans at the time, place, and using the device that is best for them. Digital lending can help banks with faster loan decisions, more consis...

This episode examines a blog post from PCBB titled “What is Proptech, and how can it help with CRE lending?” Proptech is the marrying of real estate and technology to change the way that real estate is marketed, sold, and managed. Some examples include Zillow, Airbnb, Appfolio, and Buildium. Proptech can help banks in the following ways: CRE transactions, risk management, lending decisions, stream...

This episode examines an article from Independent Banker Magazine titled “What makes a leader truly great? Experts weigh in.” This article shares seven traits of great leaders. Those traits include putting people first, make community a top priority, lead with authenticity, listen and respond mindfully, value education, make thoughtful but efficient decisions, and lift others up. A link to the art...

This episode examines an article from Bank Director titled “Billions of sub debt set to reprice, forcing banks to explore options.” Banks issued billions in subordinated debt in 2020 and 2021. That debt is about to be repriced. Bank boards and management teams have some interesting decisions to make. A link to the article is included below. Link: Billions of Sub Debt Set To Reprice, Forcing Banks...

This episode provides an update on the bank M&A market for the first half of 2025. We examine three articles from S&P Global Market Intelligence (subscription required) and we review a blog post from PCBB titled “Stats show 2025 is M&A’s year, but what’s helping deals succeed.” Bank M&A was quiet for most of 2024 and then picked up toward the end of the year. 2025 is off to a slow...

The Banker Next Door (BND) weekly live stream show. Strategy Room provides financial news, commentary, top stories in the business world, economic indicators, and all things banking for the week.

This episode examines an article from the abfjournal titled “Federal Reserve Research Warns Bank-Private Credit Ties Create “Systemic Risk” and a research report from the Federal Reserve titled “Bank Lending to Private Credit: Size, Characteristics, and Financial Stability Implications.” Private Credit has grown exponentially in the last five years. The growth of this lending area has now gotten t...

This episode examines an article from The Wall Street Journal (subscription required) titled “Bags of cash from drug cartels flood teller windows at U.S. banks.” Chinese money launders are hard at work funneling their ill-gotten gains through big banks. What is going on here? Why are big banks allowing this? Why are people not being prosecuted for it?

This episode examines an article from The Business Journal (subscription required) titled “Employers put a price on master’s degrees. It’s changing pay scales.” An MBA degree used to be a sure-fire way to the executive ranks and a big salary. Not so much anymore. Employers’ opinions on the value of an MBA are changing. Some value it and some do not. These opinions influence pay and advancement. Is...

This episode examines a blog post from Bank Director and an article from The Wall Street Journal (subscription required) titled “The Giants of Silicon Valley are having a midlife crisis over AI.” As the major players in Silicon Valley battle over dominance in the AI space, the rest of us are left to wonder, how will AI be regulated?

This is part 21 of the crypto series. In this episode we review the potential for crypto in your 401(k), Block’s bitcoin checkout in Vegas, Circle’s IPO, Trump Media shares drop as it decides to buy bitcoin, and President Trump’s memecoin dinner.  

This episode reviews a research report from Cornerstone Advisors title: The Journey Toward 2030: Becoming a Smarter Bank. The report details 5 pillars that are key to becoming a smarter bank. They include hyper-efficient, data-driven, nimble, differentiated, and opportunistic. The pillars address the biggest challenges banks and credit unions face today, offering a blueprint for the journey toward...

This episode reviews the Federal Reserve Senior Loan Officer Opinion Survey (SLOOS) on bank lending practices for April 2025. Some of the key findings of the report include tighter lending standards and weaker demand for C&I loans, unchanged lending standards and weaker demand for CRE loans, and loans for RRE, HELOC, credit cards, and other consumer loans remain tepid. A link to the report is...

This episode reviews a white paper issued by the Independent Community Bankers Association (ICBA) on Industrial Loan Companies (ILCs). This white paper outlines the history of the ILC charter, the growth of the ILC industry, why ILCs are a threat, and finally why the ILC “loophole” should be closed. A link to the report is included below. Link: ilc-white-paper.pdf

This episode reviews the FDIC 2024 Annual Report of Activities. This report details the activities of the Office of the Ombudsman within the FDIC. What is the Ombudsman and what do they do? The Ombudsman serves as a confidential, neutral, independent, and informal liaison for the banking industry and the general public by facilitating the resolution of problems and complaints against the FDIC rela...

This episode reviews the FDIC Risk Review Report for 2025. Some of the key findings from the report include economic conditions remained solid in 2024, banking industry was resilient in 2024 despite the challenges of an inverted yield curve and higher interest rates, market risks continue to challenge the banking industry, and credit risk varied by loan type. The report also covers consumer lendin...

This episode reviews the OCC Interest Rate Risk Statistics Report for Spring 2025. The report shows that smaller financial institutions are very sensitive to an upward movement in interest rates. EVE is also very sensitive to upward interest rate shocks. Larger banks appear to be less sensitive to upward interest rate shocks. Non-maturity deposits could potentially be a problem for large banks, wh...

This episode is a review of the Federal Reserve Board of Governors annual Economic Well-Being of U.S. Households in 2024 report. Some of the key findings from the report include inflation continued to be a top financial concern, the labor market remained solid, people continued to earn money doing gigs, emergency savings measures remained similar to the previous two years, and financial fraud cont...

This episode is a review of the FDIC Quarterly Banking Profile for Q1 2025. For all banks, net income increased from prior quarter, NIM ticked down, asset quality metrics remain generally favorable with a little bit of weakness in certain portfolios, loan growth remained tepid, deposits were up for a third straight quarter, and the DIF reserve ratio increased by 3 bps. A link to the report is incl...

The Banker Next Door (BND) weekly live stream show. Strategy Room provides financial news, commentary, top stories in the business world, economic indicators, and all things banking for the week.

This episode examines an article from Independent Banker Magazine titled “Workplace Culture: A make or break for community bank employees?” The article recommends six ways that a community bank can maintain a strong culture. They include hiring with culture in mind, set cultural expectations, a chance to speak up, reward and recognize, demonstrate empathy, and team efforts start at the top. A link...

This episode examines an article from Independent Banker Magazine titled “Drive efficiency with these 9 back-office upgrades.” The 9 recommendations for increasing efficiency include automate loan exceptions, use RPA to reduce repetitive tasks, establish common sense practices, reduce the use of spreadsheets, get maximum value out of existing solutions, have AI help with the compliance, enable e-s...

This episode examines a report from the National Association of Realtors and Realtor.com titled “Affordability and Homebuilding: State-by-State Report Cards.” This report breaks down, state-by-state, affordability and supply. Some of the key findings focus on income-based affordability gaps, deficit of affordable homes, impact on first-time buyers, state-level disparities, and impact of mortgage r...

This episode examines an article from The Wall Street Journal (subscription required) titled “Why there will never be another Warren Buffett.” The author provides three reasons why there will never be another Warren Buffett: the person, the period, and the package. Warren was a unique individual who was obsessed with studying companies. He was trained by Benjamin Graham, himself a financial legend...