Banking News

Wisconsin, USA, banking group Associated Banc-Corp has announced the formation of a new asset management company, Kellogg Asset Management, to target institutional clients.

Malaysians Mohd Khairuddin Abu Bakar, 53, and Gazali Rashid, 50, have been charged in Kuala Lumpur that they tricked a vice president of HSBC in the USA into granting a loan of 10 million euros.

The PNC Financial Services Group, Inc. says that it has successfully completed the conversion of more than 6 million customers and 1,300 branches from National City Bank to PNC Bank. The overall branch conversion, the fourth biggest in U.S. banking history, was completed without any major issues and finished six months ahead of schedule, says the company. This is how it did it.

The UK's new Lord Chancellor, The Rt Hon George Osborne MP, came into office just in time to make the speech at the annual Lord Chancellor's Dinner at The Mansion House, the official residence of the Lord Mayor of London. For the first time, the new Government's plans for the financial sector were given shape. And a new commitment to simplify - and make more effective - the law, regulation and enforcement in the area of white collar crime.

United Community Bancorp, Inc. has announced that its subsidiary, United Community Bank, has completed the purchase of three branch offices and certain loans of Integra Bank National Association. The acquisition completed following the close of business on Friday 4 June 2010 at which time the Integra Bank National Association branch offices located in the towns of Osgood, Milan and Versailles, Indiana became branch offices of United Community Bank.

When the Reserve Branch of Australia began to print bank notes for other countries, it never imagined that its specialist subsidiary would be accused of bribery and corruption. But the allegations have been made and the ripples are spreading wider than Securency International.

Way back in the mists of time, UK banks were told they had to leave South Africa because of sanctions against the apartheid regime. And both Barclays and Standard Chartered left behind substantial interests. The operations they left have had mixed fortunes as competition flourished.

A federal judge in Atlanta has unsealed an indictment charging two former Atlanta-based Integrity Bank executives, Douglas Ballard, 40, and Joseph Todd Foster, 42, both of Atlanta, and hotel developer Guy Mitchell, 50, of Coral Gables, Fla., with various acts of conspiracy, bribery, bank fraud and/or securities fraud relating to over USD80 million in loans that Mitchell obtained from Integrity Bank.

While FDIC is busy shutting down small banks and the US government pushes forward on measures to block aid to banks that are too-big-to-fail, Freddie Mac undermines the entire strategy going cap-in-hand to the government for another tranche of survival cash. It's got a balance sheet like a sieve and a begging bowl like a bucket.

Rabobank is building a highly specialist niche for itself in agribusiness. Based in The Netherlands, it operates along the lines of a form of co-operative. And it has a very wide network of offices - including some 500 subsidiaries including, as of Friday, Napa Community Bank in California. And the new member may just be a gem.