How's YOUR bank?
December 31, 2008 4:42 PM   Subscribe

 
I'm glad I don't have any money in the Suburban Federal Savings Bank!
posted by majikstreet at 5:04 PM on December 31, 2008 [1 favorite]


Finally, a high MeFi score thread I can be proud of losing:


Capitol Federal Savings Bank Topeka KS 8,073,102 2

posted by pwnguin at 5:35 PM on December 31, 2008


My bank got a 23. Not too shabby.
posted by oddman at 5:39 PM on December 31, 2008


See, what he doesn't mention is that to see what things are like nine months from now, just add 100 to everything.
posted by mightygodking at 5:56 PM on December 31, 2008


I'm not seeing TD Banknorth in the list. And, being a customer, I'd love to know its score.
posted by A dead Quaker at 6:26 PM on December 31, 2008


There's a TD Bank is on the list- scroll down. I think that's the TD Bank I use (the one that used to be Commerce). They have a rating of 2.
posted by ThePinkSuperhero at 6:28 PM on December 31, 2008 [1 favorite]


Ah yes, that's it (I too was a Commerce customer). And, thanks for the post St. Alia! I had been wondering how to figure out if my bank was in trouble.
posted by A dead Quaker at 6:35 PM on December 31, 2008


If you guys have an RBC bank around (used to be Centura here in NC) it seems to be doing just peachy.

The fact they are Canadian probably didn't hurt any.
posted by St. Alia of the Bunnies at 6:48 PM on December 31, 2008


No savings and loans. Is this deliberate?
posted by Blazecock Pileon at 6:48 PM on December 31, 2008


Happy New Year St. Alia of the Bunnies!

Thanks for this handy guide. Excellent post. Yes, like most everybody else I was wondering how the bank I put my pennies in was looking in terms of stability. It's odd that banks with a decent rating do not have this advertised in their front window so customers could be reassured.

The person who did all that work getting the list together, Chris Brunner, really is offering an excellent service to others who are in the dark about how near their bank is to collapsing. It seems to me that people have a right to know about the security of their money.

It might be a good idea to turn this concept into a website with regularly updated info over the following year.
posted by nickyskye at 6:59 PM on December 31, 2008


Very useful first post St. Alia. Thank you.
posted by netbros at 7:15 PM on December 31, 2008


Oooooooooh!

Soy Capital Bank and Trust Company Decatur IL 363,805 6

That makes me pretty happy.

Thanks for the link, St. Alia! Pet one of the little nose-twitchers for me, will you?
posted by Samizdata at 8:48 PM on December 31, 2008


Altman's Z-Score is another commonly used measure. There's a brief explanation here, and if you've got access to Bloomberg you can look up a company's Z-Score there.

Good post, I'll be intrigued to see how these results compare to Z-Scores.
posted by Infinite Jest at 1:55 AM on January 1, 2009


USAA: 4. Go team.

Bank of America seems to have 4 or 5 listings, so I'm not sure what's going on with that.

Credit unions and S&Ls don't seem to be on the bank though.

Cool link, thanks, St. Alia of the fluffies!
posted by dejah420 at 7:54 AM on January 1, 2009


Does it seem odd to anyone else that IndyMac Federal Bank, F.S.B., has a score of 0?
posted by boots at 9:22 AM on January 1, 2009


It seems to me that people have a right to know about the security of their money.

Do you have less than $250,000 in your account? Your money is totally, completely insured. I cannot emphasize this enough. You're welcome to change banks, of course--I'm not trying to tell you what to do with your money--but you're not going to lose it. You're not even going to lose access to it, the way the FDIC transfers banks.

Does it seem odd to anyone else that IndyMac Federal Bank, F.S.B., has a score of 0?

IndyMac is now 100% owned by the government. So all their assets are technically government-insured.

At work, we call the ratio that Rockwell uses "The Oklahoma Ratio.*" The actual Texas ratio--the one that analysts and other observers used in the S&L Crisis--doesn't account for Gov't-insured loans. We eventually changed it because many banks argued that gov't-insured loans shouldn't count since they won't actually lose money on them.

The Texas ratio got its name because so many banks and thrifts in Texas collapsed, partially because Texas was one of the few states that didn't allow branch banking. When a company failed, each of their "branches" counted as a separate failure. Illinois was another state operating under this regime.

And just based on a quick scan of that list, there are a bunch of thrifts (savings & loans) on there. They are, for the most part, fairly far down the list, because they either meet their 50% residential real estate-related asset requirement by holding lots of gov't-insured loans or by booking their own their loans, which means they actually don't want to give money to people who can't pay it back. Look for the "FSB" prefix at the end, for federal savings bank.

*Like Texas, but smaller. And I'm really the only one who calls it that.
posted by thecaddy at 11:37 AM on January 1, 2009


Another quick note: most of this data is from the end of the third quarter, or earlier. A number of these banks (Alpha B&T, Haven Trust, Franklin Bank et alia) have already failed, and others have gotten capital infusions or sold.

This list probably doesn't includes capital injected through TARP, either.

This is a nice chart, but Chris Brunner should rerun it at the end of February to get the most up to date data.
posted by thecaddy at 11:51 AM on January 1, 2009


All the local NM banks came out under 100. That's good to know, although I'm with a credit union which has a sound balance sheet.
posted by krinklyfig at 12:41 PM on January 1, 2009


As Canadians have access to a grand total of five banks who account for 90% of all assets, I gotta say: that's a real big list.
posted by Paid In Full at 8:07 AM on January 2, 2009


thecaddy said: Do you have less than $250,000 in your account? Your money is totally, completely insured.

While that is true, the fact is that it can take up to 7 years to get funds from the FDIC. 7 years is a long ass time to go between grocery trips and mortgage payments.
posted by dejah420 at 9:51 AM on January 2, 2009 [1 favorite]


Twelve of the twenty-five most troubled banks are in Georgia. Anyone have an explanation?
posted by gum at 9:05 AM on January 4, 2009


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