The Banker Next Door

In this episode we examine the challenges of starting a De Novo Bank, the surge in bank charters and what type of companies are applying for them, and should a bank consider changing its charter to fit its future strategy. A De Novo Bank must raise a significant amount of money to get started. They must also consider market fit, capital and investor base, strategic differentiation, and execution c...

Rich Carty is a bank consultant with Remedy Consulting. Rich seeks to educate potential clients on the strategic and financial impact that Remedy creates. Remedy consulting specializes in technology contract negotiation, system assessment, strategic planning, and M&A support. Rich and I discuss Remedy consulting, the technology that community banks should be focusing on and the strategies that...

This video is a clip from BND: Strategy Room Live Stream on March 28, 2026. SpaceX is preparing for the largest IPO in the history of Wall Street! The IPO is scheduled to take place in June of this year. The expectation is that the IPO will raise over $1 trillion dollars. However, before that happens, Elon is completing the process of rolling X into xAI, then xAI into SpaceX. Why would Elon roll u...

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.

Why should you study economics? Some things to consider, where does wealth come from? How does it grow? Why do economies go up and down? Is inflation really ‘transitory’? Why have tariffs not caused inflation? If the unemployment rate is under 5%, is that good or bad? Economics drives are understanding of the world around us. For business people and bankers, many of the decisions they make daily a...

What is the difference between a tokenized deposit and stablecoin? Tokenized deposits are issued by a bank, denominated in fiat, backed 1:1 by funds on the bank’s balance sheet, and accessible only to customers who have completed standard KYC onboarding. Tokenized deposits operate on a permissioned network where participation is controlled and restricted to known parties. Stablecoin are digital to...

How are banks currently being affected by regulatory changes that have taken hold in the last few years? We focus on three specific items 1) SBA lending, 2) CFPB 1071 rule, and 3) FinCen beneficial ownership information (BOI). The SBA has made multiple changes returning to a more pre-pandemic and pre-Biden administration stance. The 1071 rule requirements being enacted by the CFPB will kick in for...

This video is a clip from BND: Strategy Room Live Stream on March 21, 2026. The state of Arizona has filed criminal charges against Kalshi. Arizona is claiming that the Prediction Markets company is operating an illegal gambling business without a license. Businesses are now becoming highly concerned that insider trading is happening on Prediction Market platforms as the market is projected to gro...

This video is a clip from BND: Strategy Room Live Stream on March 21, 2026. The problems in the Private Credit Market are turning into a contagion! MFS solutions, a UK mortgage lender, collapsed! Banks are looking to lend additional money to Private credit funds, even as withdrawals continue to increase. The legal battles between Western Alliance Bank and Jefferies expose many of the underlying ri...

Interview with former banker and current digital asset expert, consultant, and speaker Wade Peery. Wade and I discuss several topics. We start with his banking career, background, and why he decided to put off retirement. We then move into what he is currently working on, which is helping banks around the country with digital assets. Beyond helping banks, Wade has also gotten into public speaking,...

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.

I have covered the trend of major migration from Democrat states to Republican states in prior episodes. Since then, the reality of a billionaire’s tax has been moving ever closer. Washington State is looking to pass a millionaire’s tax. The net effect of these actions has been an acceleration of billionaires moving to red states such as Texas and Florida. What happens to the U.S. if this migratio...

Do you really own the stocks, bonds, ETFs, and Mutual Funds sitting in your IRA, 401(k), or brokerage account? You do, but not in the way that you think. You are NOT the legal owner of that security. You own a contractual claim, what the law calls a “security entitlement” against a financial intermediary. Does this matter most of the time? No. Does this matter if we have a major financial crisis o...

What happens during a bank merger? How does the deal making process start? How does the deal come together? This episode seeks to answer those questions by going behind the scenes with a look at two bank mergers. We examine mergers between QNB Bank and Victory Bank and LINKBANCORP and Burke & Herbert Financial Services Corp. With both M&A examples we consider the ongoing negotiations, the...

Entrepreneur Alex Blomstrom returns to the podcast. Alex has been very busy over the last year recreating her brand. Alex’s first company was Alex Blom Creates. She has rebranded that business as Blue Horizon Clothing Co. Alex and I discussed business strategy, changes that entrepreneurs go through over time, social media, marketing strategy, and the realities of tariffs and increasing oil prices...

Banker Allan Burkley returns to the podcast. We discuss the ongoing issues in the Private Credit Market, stablecoins, crypto legislation, the increase in bank charter applications, and how fintech and crypto players might transform bank strategy. Allan Burkley is a highly experienced commercial banker. He currently works for Tompkins Bank. You can follow him on LinkedIn.

This video is a clip from BND: Strategy Room Live Stream on March 14, 2026. Jerome Powell appears to have escaped potential problems from subpoenas issued in regards to the renovations of several buildings on which costs have ballooned up to $2.5 billion. A federal court judge blocked subpoenas that were issued from a grand jury. Some will say the investigation into the Federal Reserve was highly...

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 report is crazy! Pulaksi Savings Bank failed in January of 2025. The FDIC Office of Inspector General (OIG) complete an in-depth review of the bank’s failure, which was completed in March 2026. Initially, when the bank was closed by the FDIC, they stated that fraud was suspected. The newly released OIG report blamed the failure on ‘key employees’ and $20+ million in liabilities NOT listed in...

What is the CFPB really costing American consumers? Three reports have recently been released from the U.S. Government Accountability Office (GAO), the U.S. Senate Committee on Banking, Housing, & Urban Affairs, and The White House Council of Economic Advisors. These reports had dueling narratives about what the impact and cost of the CFPB has been on the American consumer. The report from GAO...

The Financial Stability Board (FSB) released a report in February 2026 that outlines three vulnerabilities in government bond-backed Repo Markets. The interlinked potential sources of structural vulnerabilities include 1) Repo Markets can facilitate a build-up of leverage, 2) Demand and supply imbalances in Repo Markets can arise quickly in stress periods, and 3) Repo Markets are highly concentrat...

Cornerstone Advisors released their annual report ‘What’s Going on in Banking’ for 2026. The report focuses on Banks and Credit Unions in the United States and provides survey results from hundreds of bankers. The main themes in this year’s report were AI, crypto, tech spending, fraud, and payment channels. Most bankers are very optimistic about the overall outlook for 2026. Deposit gathering is t...

Dr. Murray Rothbard (March 2, 1926 to January 7, 1995) would have turned 100 on March 2, 2026. Dr. Rothbard was an American economist of the Austrian School, an economic historian, political theorist, and activist. Dr. Rothbard was one of the most prominent economic thinkers of the 20th century. He was a central figure in the libertarian movement. Politically he was right leaning but got involved...

This video is a clip from BND: Strategy Room Live Stream on March 7, 2026. The approximately $1.8 Trillion private credit market turmoil has entered a new phase. It started last year with the failures of Tricolor Holdings, First Brands, and several other small companies. Now Blue Owl Capital is in free fall, BlackRock is restricting investors from withdrawing from one fund while marking down the v...

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.