humble3d Posted November 14, 2014 Share Posted November 14, 2014 Bank branches fading away...Bank branch closures are heading for a record year as the industry trims down and servicesget increasingly electronic.Institutions have shut 2,599 branches in 2014 against 1,137 openings, a net loss of 1,462that is just off 2013's record full-year total of 1,487, according to SNL Financial. Themove brings total U.S. branches down to 94,752, a decline of 1.5 percent.The trend, which has branches at their lowest aggregate level in at least eight years, hascome about due to a plethora of reasons: A surge in mergers and acquisitions, primarilyconcentrated in regional banks but recently spreading to larger ones; the move to e-bankingwhere customers can do most of their tasks either online or at automated tellers; and theeconomics of a low-interest-rate narrow-yield-curve environment that makes it lessprofitable to be spread out.Top bank closuresBank ClosuresBank of America 148SunTrust 60BNP Paribas 47KeyCorp 45JPMorgan Chase 40Source: SNL FinancialGeneral economics also play a role; JPMorgan Chase, for instance, lost some 45 branches inthe Chicago area when Dominick's Finer Foods announced it was closing or selling 72 stores,many with bank satellites, while the Bank of Oklahoma said this week it will shutter 24grocery store branches, primarily because of the preference for off-site banking."We launched the Instore grocery branch model back in the mid-1990s as a way to add anotherconvenience option for clients who were visiting the grocery store and the bank weekly, oreven more often," said Pat Piper, Bank of Oklahoma's executive vice president for consumerbanking, in remarks reported by NewsOK. "Today, the majority of our clients are using mobileand online banking, as well as deposit-friendly ATMs, for the transactions they used to doin these regular bank visits."Advocates have bemoaned the years-long trend of branch closures, with the NationalCommunity Reinvestment Coalition saying in a report that "the critical services they provideare essential to the vibrancy of communities." The group said that when branches close itopens to door to, among other things, predatory lenders.But banking analyst Dick Bove thinks fear of branch extinction is overblown, with the trendlikely to abate once the Federal Reserve normalizes interest rate policy and the yieldcurve—the spread between bonds of various duration—starts to expand."When banks are trying to collect deposits because the yield curve is steep and you're ableto make a reasonable return on deposits, you open up branches," the Rafferty Capital Marketsvice president of equity research said in an interview. "When you have a flatter yieldcurve, low interest rates and you don't want to attract deposits, you close branches."Among institutions, Bank of America has been the most aggressive in closing offices,shutting down 41 in the third quarter alone and 148 over the past year. The bank is thesecond largest by deposits after JPMorgan and ranked third in branches as of June 30 with5,099, according to the U.S. Bank Locations site.Regionally speaking, the Chicago area has lost the most, with 125 shutting, whileWashington, D.C., has been the next hardest hit with 39 closures, according to SNL.Illinois leads the way among states, only six of which showed net additions over the past12 months. The biggest gainer was Nebraska, with nine new branches. (Go here for a heat mapon branch closings.)Top 5 states for closuresRank State Closures1 Illinois 1362 Pennsylvania 923 Ohio 844 Michigan 755 New York 70Source: SNL FinancialBove also attributed the high level of branch closings to a corresponding decline in banks.There were 6,978 banks in the U.S. at the beginning of 2009 and just 5,693 by midyear 2014,according to the St. Louis Fed. That's a decline of 18.4 percent.Read More › Fed to big banks: Clean up your act or you're doneHe said banks are returning to a "spoke-and-wheel" approach in which more responsibilityfor operations is delegated through branches. The reason is that there is still a need tosell products, and that can't be done through electronic banking."There are a whole bunch of factors related to branches—the configuration of branches, thesizes of branches," Bove said. "But they will never, ever go away."http://www.cnbc.com/id/102182556 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
jackieo Posted November 15, 2014 Share Posted November 15, 2014 cashless society when the grid fails ( insert reason here) its instant stone-age ( no power, water, or fuel)and only food and water and ammo will be valuable.fuck the banks. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
CODYQX4 Posted November 15, 2014 Share Posted November 15, 2014 cashless society when the grid fails ( insert reason here) its instant stone-age ( no power, water, or fuel)and only food and water and ammo will be valuable.fuck the banks.People like the question, "can you survive in a world like that?"I ask myself a better question, "do I want to survive to live in a hellhole like that?".But yes, when push comes to shove people will find out that lead, not gold, is the most useful metal to have. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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