BankThink

Big banks' alleged manipulation of Libor may have been unethical, but the FDIC faces long odds in proving that their actions caused community banks to fail.

Receiving Wide Coverage ...

Bank of America's Big Blunder: The papers are abuzz with the question of who Â-- or what Â-- is to blame for the big accounting error that caused Bank of America to misreport its capital levels under the Federal Reserve's stress test. Perhaps the bank's employees need to work on their listening skills, if the Wall Street Journal's characterization of the mistake as rooted in a "communications blunder" between two internal units...

If bankers want their branches to be successful, theyÂ'll have to start thinking beyond cost-efficiency, says Paul Seibert, vice president of financial design for EHS Design.

Receiving Wide Coverage ... Fed's Stein Gets Fond and Fearful Farewell: Economist Jeremy Stein is resigning from the Federal Reserve's board of governors to return to his position as a Harvard professor at the end of May, and people who worry that the central bank's historically low short-term interest rates could incite another credit bubble are missing him already. Stein "has made an intellectual mark in a critical area where leading members of the [Federal OpenÂ...

By addressing concerns about how distressed loans are resolved, banks and non-banks alike can make a virtue out of necessity and regain the trust of policy makers and the public.