Correspondent Blog

Take a second to think about how much of your operating, sales and marketing effort is spent acquiring new customers versus growing your existing customers. If you are like most banks, 80% of your effort is not directed at increasing product usage. This could be a problem because when you look at conversion rates for…

Something might be getting lost in the tribal knowledge of managing time deposits. Certificate of deposit (CD) “specials” and the odd-month CD offering are good examples. As the legacy knowledge of deposit gathering is passed down from generation to generation of banker, some of the finer points of liability structuring are getting diluted with some…

If managing loan pricing is a college-level course, deposit pricing is a master’s. Given the complexity, managing analyzed checking, however, is a PhD. level effort. There are all the dynamics of traditional accounts plus often two different interest rates, the ability to offset fees, and a variety of adjustments. We covered the basics of account…

Recently, the American Banker hosted their annual Small Business Banking Conference in Nashville, and as always, it was one of the better banking conferences of the year. This conference is crucial because it provides insight into small business banking and has a good mix of essential banking-focused topics with a heavy emphasis on the customer…

If one product is the future of banking, it is treasury management. With a competitive offering, it will be easier to attract the small business and mid-sized companies that a bank needs to fuel its core growth. In this article, we detail the five steps to building a treasury management strategy, provide some tools to…

In the wake of regional bank failures, one potential answer to equity shorting and bank runs is having the FDIC increase deposit insurance.  The regulators are considering three options: raising the limit above $250k, raising the cap for only certain accounts (such as banks’ business accounts), or eliminating the cap entirely.  Increasing insurance coverage on…

Adjusting pricing for deposit tiering according to account size is essentially a tradition in banking. A typical bank’s money market accounts often have six tiers ranging from $2,000 to $100,000. The question that always comes up is whether you have suitable tiers and the correct number of tiers. Are you using your tiers to drive…

In the quest for deposits, one successful tactic at top-performing banks is to target the right types of customers. While desiring to bank everyone in your community is noble, it can be a poor use of resources. Some customers offer better returns because they use more banking services and have more deposit balances. Not to…

In our industry, many banks need to put more thought into the science and strategy of deposit promotions. This is, unfortunately, occurring as the number of deposit promotions is approaching a near-term high, and banks are throwing away money like an untargeted ad campaign. Not leveraging media, not having a current deposit pricing strategy, not…

The banking industry’s cost of funds (COF) is highly correlated to short-term interest rates.  However, as of Q2/22, the average community bank’s COF has risen only a few basis points.  Community banks should be concerned about their COF because looking at current deposit conditions is like driving a car while looking at the rearview mirror….

A yield curve is a relationship between yield and different maturity dates. The yield curve’s slope can provide insight into future interest rate changes and economic activity. There is much discussion in the market about the current inverted yield curve between the two and ten-year Treasury yields. However, for bankers, the critical dates on the…

More than a year ago, the Federal Reserve changed Regulation D, Section 19 to allow an unlimited amount of withdrawals or transfers from a customer’s savings or money market account. Most banks immediately changed their policies to pass on this freedom to their customers. Some banks proactively left the limit in place or modified the…