News

American Banker | Tuesday, January 12, 2021

The Paycheck Protection Program's soft launch received mixed reviews, creating uncertainty over when the portal will be open to all participating lenders. The Small Business Administration limited access on Monday to community development financial institutions, minority depository institutions and other mission-driven lenders, representing about a tenth of all the companies participating in the emergency loan program. “It’s a challenging situation for us,” said Robert James II, director of strategic initiatives at the $48.4 million-asset Carver Financial, a Black-owned bank in Savannah, Ga., that has yet to make any loans under the restart.

Mighty Deposits | Monday, January 11, 2021

The veteran Chicago banker and VP of Mission Deposits and Community Relationships at Providence Bank & Trust talks about the higher purpose he sees in banking. Milsap says that his goal is to build relationships between his bank and the community they serve by making clear our bank’s focus on community lending and stewardship. 

Next City | Tuesday, January 5, 2021

The recently passed coronavirus relief package will include $9 billion to the newly restored Emergency Capital Investment Fund. The $9 billion Emergency Capital Investment Fund isn't supposed to be a bailout for eligible banks and credit unions. It's intended to position the eligible lenders to make new loans as the economy recovers over the next few years — particularly small businesses loans. “It’s a gargantuan amount of money,” says Jeannine Jacokes, chief executive at the Community Development Bankers Association. “It’s either going to be absolutely game changing or it’s going to be a dud. It’s all in how Treasury implements it.”

American Banker | Monday, January 4, 2021

City First Bank of D.C. and CEO Brian Argrett entered 2021 with lofty goals. The $394 million-asset bank is in the homestretch of completing a merger with Broadway Financial in Los Angeles that would create the nation’s biggest Black-led bank. The deal, scheduled to close in the first half of this year, comes at a time when more banks are focusing on addressing racial inequality. Argrett is one of American Banker’s five community bankers to watch this year.

American Banker | Wednesday, December 30, 2020

Several consumer advocacy groups are opposing Oportun Financial's application for a national bank charter, citing concerns about the company's lending and debt-collection practices. Many of those issues came to light in a ProPublica investigation over the summer that focused on the high proportion of collection suits that the online lender had filed in recent years and its high proportion of repeat borrowers. Oportun charges high interest rates, rolls over too much debt and has been too quick to take borrowers to court when they fall behind on payments, the community groups wrote in comment letters to the Office of the Comptroller of the Currency. The company’s application also lacks a sufficient Community Reinvestment Act plan, several of the groups wrote.

House Appropriations Committee | Tuesday, December 22, 2020

The President is expected to sign the $900 billion COVID relief bill passed by Congress yesterday. Find here a 29 page summary on the most relevant aspects of the stimulus package. 

New York Times | Monday, December 21, 2020

The stimulus package being negotiated in Washington includes $285 billion for a renewed Paycheck Protection Program. The bill includes other aid measures that are not specifically part of the Paycheck Protection Program but could nonetheless help many small businesses. This includes $12 billion for Community Development Financial Institutions, which make loans and grants to people and communities that are often unable to get traditional banks to do business with them. That amount of money would be transformational, said Jeannine Jacokes, the chief executive of the Community Development Bankers Association, a trade group for community financial institutions. “Every time we have a recession, low-income places are hit the hardest and are the last to recover,” Ms. Jacokes said. “Treasury is providing the capital for a long-term investment in these communities.”

Business Wire | Tuesday, December 15, 2020

Yelp Inc., the company that connects people with great local businesses, today announced it has deposited $10 million of its cash reserves with minority-owned financial institutions that support Black and underserved communities, including Broadway Federal Bank (Broadway), Carver Federal Savings Bank (Carver) and Citizens Savings Bank and Trust Company (Citizens Savings Bank). According to The Wall Street Journal, fifteen years ago America had 36 Black-owned banks,2 and today the FDIC reports only 20.3 Yelp selected Broadway, Carver and Citizens Savings Bank because of their immense impact on their respective communities. 

Consumer Financial Protection Bureau | Monday, December 14, 2020

The Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (Bureau) released a panel report as part of its rulemaking process under Dodd-Frank Act Section 1071 governing the collection and reporting of small business lending data. A panel was convened pursuant to the Small Business Regulatory Enforcement Fairness Act, comprised of representatives of the Bureau, the Office of Advocacy of the Small Business Administration, and the Office of Management and Budget. The panel consulted with representatives of small entities likely to be affected directly by a Section 1071 regulation, referred to as small entity representatives or SERs. These representatives included Cynthia Newell of City First Bank of DC and Jane Henderson of Virginia Community Capital. 

Wall Street Journal | Monday, December 14, 2020

Even as Covid-19 cases surge world-wide, the arrival of viable vaccines holds the promise of a return to something resembling normality by the middle of next year. But the commercial real-estate sector may never get back to normal, and that could spell trouble for banks. Many banks are concentrated in and dependent on commercial property lending. Bankshold half of all commercial real-estate loans. The 5,000 or so U.S. community banks, withabout a third of total assets, are two to three times as concentrated in commercial real-estate lending as the approximately 30 larger banks. Problems in commercial real estate can hurt banks in two ways. Losses on existing loanscan damage earnings directly, and a correction can reduce future lending volumes,impairing an important driver of earnings. Based on what we know now, things don’t look good.

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