Banking News and Headlines
Banking News and Headlines
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EMAIL DIGESTS
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EMAIL DIGESTS
Daily
Every morning
Weekly
Tuesday recap
Mortgage refinance demand stalled in mid‑March as the 30‑year fixed rate jumped to 6.30%, the highest level since December 2025. The MBA’s weekly survey showed total applications down 10.9% and the refinance index falling 19% week‑over‑week, while purchase applications edged up 1%. Refinance activity now accounts for 52.3% of all applications, down from 57.8% the prior week. The slowdown reflects borrowers’ sensitivity to even modest rate increases amid rising Treasury yields and oil‑price pressures.
OakNorth reported a pre‑tax profit of £223 million for 2025 and saw new loan originations jump 33% to £2.8 billion. The United States contributed 40% of fresh lending, underscoring rapid market penetration since its 2023 entry. Credit quality remained exceptional, with cumulative...
On 17 March 2026 the European Commission launched a Call for Evidence to revise the EU State aid rules for banks in difficulty, aligning them with the revised Crisis Management and Deposit Insurance (CMDI) framework expected in Q2 2026. The existing rules predate...
The piece argues that alternative business lending has drifted from fueling growth to becoming a lifeline for struggling SMEs. Over 90% of surveyed firms use loans to cover rent, payroll or existing debt rather than to expand, turning credit into...
South Africa’s Postbank has been granted a licence by the Financial Sector Conduct Authority to provide financial advice and intermediary services under the Financial Advisory and Intermediary Services Act. The regulatory approval, welcomed by Deputy Minister Mondli Gungubele and parliamentary...
Lloyds Banking Group says its digital bank has expanded by 50%, now serving 23 million digitally active retail customers who generate roughly 7 billion interactions annually. The group has hired 9,000 new engineering and tech staff and already runs 800 AI models,...
Regulatory frameworks across the US, Canada, Europe and the CFTC impose strict record‑retention periods, ranging from one to seven years, leaving firms little margin for missing communications. Gaps in data ingestion trigger regulator scrutiny and can signal heightened operational risk....
South Africa’s major banks are intensifying a digital arms race, using mobile‑first platforms and AI to capture market share. PwC’s Major Banks Analysis shows combined earnings rose 9.4 % to R152.5 billion in 2025, supported by disciplined cost control and strong non‑interest...
The UK government plans to amend the credit‑union common‑bond rules across England, Scotland and Wales. The locality bond membership cap will rise from three to ten million, and new eligibility categories will include students, relatives outside the household, and retirees....
Comply Exchange’s February 2026 roundup flags key FATCA, CRS, and IRS filing deadlines for financial institutions. Bahamas AEOI participants must submit FATCA/CRS data by March 31, 2026, while U.S. Form 1042 and 1042‑S filings closed on March 16, 2026. The IRS announced the FIRE system will...
The Bank of England’s Prudential Regulation Authority has finalized its Basel 3.1 framework, slated to take effect at the start of 2027. In an IQ interview, executive director David Bailey highlighted the need for global regulatory consistency while acknowledging the challenges...
The Trump administration is dismantling core fair‑lending protections by targeting the Equal Credit Opportunity Act, Fair Housing Act, Home Mortgage Disclosure Act and the Section 1071 small‑business data rule. An executive order eliminates the disparate‑impact theory, while the CFPB proposes to...
African banks are beginning to measure financed emissions using the PCAF methodology, with Egypt’s Commercial International Bank (CIB) leading the effort in the region. While South Africa and Kenya have made notable progress in ESG integration, more than 80% of...
The Bank of England will announce its March 19 interest‑rate decision, weighing whether to keep the Bank Rate at 3.75% or trim it by 25 basis points to 3.50%. A narrow 5‑4 vote in February highlighted deep divisions within the...
Sanction compliance is essential for financial institutions operating internationally, requiring senior‑level commitment, risk assessments, and ongoing controls. Regulators such as OFAC mandate detailed reporting of blocked assets and rejected transfers, each with specific data fields and tight deadlines. Institutions must...
Non‑QM products, especially bank‑statement loans, are filling a financing gap for self‑employed borrowers whose income patterns defy conventional underwriting. By evaluating cash deposits rather than taxable income, these loans capture true cash flow and enable credit access with higher down‑payment...
FinTech Australia announced the inaugural Data Horizons Summit, a one‑day event on 8 May 2026 in Sydney. The summit builds on its successful Consumer Data Right and Net Zero gatherings, highlighting that more than one million Australians now use open‑banking...
President Trump issued an executive order aimed at expanding home‑lending opportunities for community financial institutions with assets under $100 million. Mortgage Bankers Association President Bob Broeksmit praised the intent but warned that the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau’s reduced staffing will slow...
Sub‑4% fixed‑rate mortgages have vanished from the UK market as major banks withdrew the last remaining two‑ and five‑year products in early March. The pull‑back follows a wave of lender repricing driven by rising swap rates and heightened margin concerns....
India's banking system liquidity surplus shrank to ₹75,483 crore after a ₹2 lakh crore advance‑tax outflow, pushing overnight money‑market rates to 5.31 %. The RBI responded with a 7‑day variable‑rate repo, but attracted only ₹48,014 crore in bids. Simultaneously, the central bank sold over $15 billion...
UBS Group AG suffered a global technology outage on Tuesday that forced a halt to portions of its trading business. The bank quickly identified the root cause and deployed a fix, allowing systems to recover. The disruption arrived amid heightened...
Dean M. Leavitt, CEO of Boost Payment Solutions, highlights the widening gap between frictionless consumer payments and the cumbersome, legacy‑driven B2B payment landscape. He argues that B2B transactions suffer from slow settlement, rigid processes, and limited personalization due to high‑value...
Crypto.com has teamed up with KG Inicis, South Korea’s leading payment gateway that controls roughly 40% of the market, to enable crypto‑based payments for inbound tourists. The integration routes crypto transactions through Crypto.com Pay, instantly converting them to Korean won...
Home equity lines of credit (HELOCs) are losing their hallmark flexibility as non‑bank lenders dominate the market and impose large upfront draw requirements, often 80% or more of the credit line. While the Federal Reserve estimates $34 trillion in homeowner equity,...
Three banking‑industry groups and the Office of the Comptroller of the Currency filed amicus briefs urging the appellate court to overturn Illinois’s Interchange Fee Prohibition Act (IFPA) exemption. The IFPA, set to take effect July 1, shields Illinois merchants from interchange...
Kansas banking officials testified before a joint House‑Senate committee urging lawmakers to pass House Bill 2648, which would make social‑media platforms and telecommunications providers liable for fraud that harms banks and consumers. The bill requires platforms like Meta to verify...
Non‑agency jumbo mortgage originations surged in the fourth quarter, pushing total nonconforming loans to $401 billion for 2025 and lifting the share of such loans to 20.9% of all originations. The Biden‑era administration’s executive order, signed by President Trump, directs the...
The European Banking Authority (EBA) issued an updated list of ITS validation rules, highlighting deactivated, reactivated, and severity‑status changes. It reminded EU competent authorities not to validate data against deactivated rules. The EBA also launched a small validation‑rules package containing...
Safaricom and Vodacom have launched a tap‑to‑pay option for M‑Pesa users in Tanzania, allowing Android smartphones to make contactless payments at Visa‑enabled terminals. The service, built on Paymentology’s NFC infrastructure, eliminates the need for Paybill numbers or physical cards. It...
Cumbuca, led by CEO Daniel Ruhman, provides a licensed proxy that lets global fintechs tap Brazil's regulated payments ecosystem without building their own licences. The platform connects clients directly to infrastructure such as Pix and open‑finance while handling compliance, allowing...
The European Central Bank’s digital euro proposal aims to cement Europe’s digital sovereignty and foster fair competition ahead of a potential 2029 launch. Advocates argue that the CBDC must be sovereign, public, and inclusive to win trust from citizens and...
On 17 March 2026 the Prudential Regulation Authority released consultation paper CP5/26 to modernise the UK liquidity policy framework. The PRA proposes that firms must assess liquidity composition and monetisation risk, conduct weekly stress tests, and remove the exemption for...
BMO Financial Group announced plans to open 145 new U.S. branches—130 in California and 15 in Arizona—over the next five years, with seven California locations slated for this year. The expansion follows the Bank of the West acquisition and aims...
Thirteen state attorneys general have filed a lawsuit against OneMain Financial, alleging the lender misled subprime borrowers into purchasing costly add‑on products such as credit insurance. The complaint says employees pressured borrowers, financed premiums into loans, and sometimes charged add‑ons...
Early Warning Services (EWS) has teamed up with Citibank to bring its Paze digital wallet to Citi credit‑card holders, marking the first partnership with a non‑owner bank. The rollout is slated for the coming weeks, expanding Paze’s reach beyond the...
Petru Metzger, CEO of Payforge, emphasized three core convictions shaping his company: deep payments domain expertise, outcome‑driven execution, and AI‑enabled development. He argues that true differentiation comes from unifying strategy, analytics, and engineering rather than siloed modernization projects. The interview...
The European Banking Authority (EBA) has launched two public consultations on draft Guidelines and draft Regulatory Technical Standards (RTS) for authorising internal initial margin models under EMIR 3. The proposals target firms whose aggregate monthly notional amount of non‑centrally cleared OTC...
HSBC UK has unveiled a £5 billion AI and productivity financing initiative aimed at mid‑size companies with turnovers between £15 million and £300 million. Research by CEBR for HSBC estimates AI adoption could generate an additional £105 billion in UK revenue by 2030, with...
Commercial prepaid card loads reached $426 billion in 2025, signaling a rapidly expanding B2B market. Javelin Strategy’s 2026 report highlights healthcare benefits, employee incentives, and state‑run government programs as the most promising growth segments over the next five years. Corporate travel...
Barclays and accounting software firm Sage announced a strategic partnership aimed at streamlining administrative tasks for small and mid‑sized enterprises. The collaboration combines Barclays' business‑banking expertise with Sage's digital accounting, payroll and HR platforms to cut the time owners spend...
Yaspa’s 2026 Index shows UK open‑banking transactions jumped 53 percent year‑on‑year in 2025, yet consumer familiarity with the term “Pay by Bank” fell to 38 percent, down from 55 percent a year earlier. The survey of 2,157 adults highlights fragmented terminology—merchants use multiple...
Gross SME bank lending rose 9% to £68 billion in 2025, the second‑largest level in 13 years. Challenger and specialist banks now provide 60% of non‑overdraft SME loans, while non‑bank lenders push total alternative financing to 68% of the market. About...
Ikano Bank, the financial arm of IKEA, has leveraged robotic process automation to streamline back‑office tasks, reporting over 100,000 staff hours saved in a single year. A flagship project automated 30,000 customer name‑change records, a task that would have required...
GH Bank says it can weather economic fallout from the Middle East war, citing robust loan‑loss provisions of 160% – the fourth‑strongest among Thai banks. All its housing loans are fully collateralised, eliminating unsecured risk. Despite a sector‑wide contraction, the...
T‑Mobile’s new co‑branded Visa card from Capital One lets customers earn 5% back in T‑Mobile Rewards on phones, devices and accessories, and 2% on all other purchases. Cardholders also receive a $5 per line monthly discount when they enroll in...
Banks are finding it difficult to scale artificial‑intelligence initiatives because legacy systems consume a disproportionate share of IT spending. Capgemini’s survey shows only 29% of budgets target transformative tech while 43% fund maintenance of outdated infrastructure. New AI‑driven products are...
India’s central bank has fined fintech payments platform Cashfree Payments ₹3.1 lakh for breaching payment aggregator and gateway regulations. The RBI’s inspection of Cashfree’s activities from April 2024 to June 2025 uncovered an impermissible debit from the company’s escrow account, prompting a show‑cause...
Fraud in auto finance is accelerating, with lenders reporting a sharp uptick in sophisticated schemes. A recent InformedIQ survey of over 2,500 industry executives revealed growing skepticism about the ability of current AI‑driven detection tools to keep pace. While many...
The UK is scrapping the £100 ceiling on contactless card payments, theoretically allowing unlimited tap‑to‑pay transactions. However, many banks are signaling they will retain their own limits due to heightened fraud exposure. Contactless already dominates UK in‑store spending, with 94.6%...
India’s Unified Payments Interface (UPI) now processes more than four‑fifths of all real‑time transactions worldwide, accounting for 81% of global instant payments. Transaction volume surged from ₹7,176.9 crore in FY22 to ₹22,167.9 crore in FY25, a 35% year‑over‑year increase. The system’s expansion...
