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Concerns that the Federal Reserve could suffer losses on its massive bond holdings may have driven the central bank to adopt a little-noticed accounting change with huge implications: it makes insolvency much less likely.
The significant shift was tucked quietly into the Fed’s weekly report on its balance sheet and phrased in such technical terms that it was not even reported by financial media when originally announced on Jan. 6. Get the full story »
The chief executive of Chicago’s biggest homegrown bank says the city’s business community expected the state to hike taxes, but that the Illinois legislature needs to also quickly address spending that’s contributing to deep budget deficits.
Illinois’ corporate income tax rate recently rose from 4.8 percent to 7 percent. Earlier this week Northern Trust Corp. said it expects the tax hike to reduce its earnings by about $4 million a year. Get the full story »
Bloomberg News | The federal commission that has been investigating the meltdown in the financial industry is set to release reports with three different conclusions next week.
Bank of America Corp., the largest U.S. bank by assets, reported a second straight quarterly loss, driven by a $2 billion writedown of its mortgage business. Get the full story »
PNC Financial Services Group Inc.’s fourth-quarter profit dropped 26 percent after a big year-earlier gain, but adjusted earnings topped analysts’ expectations as revenue fell less than expected.
The bank continued to bolster its bottom line by setting aside less to cover potential loan losses. Many peers have also made that move amid improving credit quality. PNC grew during the banking crisis by purchasing troubled rivals — such as its acquisition of Ohio’s National City in late 2008 for $2 billion. Get the full story »
Most local banks owned by $2.93 billion-asset Metropolitan Bank Group Inc., a Chicago-based lender owned by animal adoption advocates Peter and Paula Fasseas, have been ordered by state and federal banking regulators to shape up. Get the full story »
On the heels of disappointing fourth-quarter earnings that drove its stock down 5.7 percent Wednesday, Northern Trust Corp., Chicago’s biggest locally headquartered bank, said the recently announced hike on Illinois business taxes will reduce its profits by an estimated $4 million a year starting in 2012.
“If it doesn’t get vetoed, and we don’t think it will,” Northern Chief Financial Officer William Morrison said during an hour-long conference call to discuss fourth quarter results. Get the full story »
Fourth-quarter profits at Goldman Sachs Group Inc. fell 53 percent as trading revenue tumbled, dashing hopes that the Wall Street bank had bucked a tough market climate that hurt its rivals.
Bond trading revenue, including commodities and currencies, slid 39 percent from the third quarter as worries about European sovereign debt and rising U.S. Treasury yields kept investors on the sidelines. Get the full story »
A former Swiss private banker handed over data on hundreds of offshore bank account holders to WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange on Monday, saying he wanted to draw attention to financial abuses.
Rudolf Elmer, 55, headed the office of Julius Baer in the Cayman Islands until he was fired by the bank in 2002. He is scheduled to go on trial in Switzerland on Wednesday for breaching bank secrecy.
Swiss national Elmer handed Assange the data at a news conference at a media club in London. The two yellow and blue discs contain information on around 2,000 banking clients, both individuals and companies, he said, declining to reveal further details on the data. Get the full story »
Update: Bank of America reported at 5 p.m. that the problem had been resolved.
Bank of America Corp. said its online banking Web site is down for a “subset” of customers but that the “majority” of depositors can still bank online.
Chicago’s No. 2 bank declined to say how many customers are currently affected and said it expects to fix the problem “shortly” but had no timetable. Get the full story »
The government announced Friday that it will auction warrants it holds from Citigroup Inc., Wintrust Financial and another smaller bank in the first quarter of this year. It is the latest effort to recoup costs of the $700 billion financial bailout. Get the full story »
JPMorgan Chase & Co reported fourth-quarter earnings jumped, helped by narrowing losses on bad loans.
The bank said earnings climbed to $4.8 billion, or $1.12 a share, from $3.3 billion, or 74 cents a share, a year earlier. Analysts on average expected a profit of $1 a share, according to Thomson Reuters I/B/E/S. Get the full story »
Crain’s Chicago Business | First Bank & Trust of Illinois has entered into a consent agreement with state and federal regulators to boost its capital standards and shed bad debt.
Some of the United States’ top bankers descended on a law firm in Manhattan on Thursday to make a pitch for managing what could be one of the largest share sales in history — a secondary offering for bailed-out insurer American International Group Inc.
JPMorgan Chief Executive Jamie Dimon was among the executives attending the meeting. Dimon entered the building of law firm Davis Polk & Wardwell LLP just after 9:30 a.m. EST in New York. Asked how the meeting went as he left, Dimon laughed and said: “How’d what go?” Get the full story »
