| On Fifth Third Bid for
Comerica CRA Protested Fed Sends
to DC But All Questions
Confidential
by
Matthew Russell Lee, Patreon Book
Substack
SDNY/SOUTH
BRONX, Nov 6 – As US
bank regulators loosen rules -
including the FDIC moving to
eliminate public comment
altogether on branch expansion
applications - now more big
banks are moving to get
bigger.
On
October 6, amid the pending
PNC - FirstBank and Pinnacle -
Synovus proposals, Fifth Third
announced it will apply to buy
damaged Comerica Bank. On
October 8-9, it was opposed,
to the Fed and OCC.
On
November 6 the Fed wrote to
Fifth Third's long-time
outside counsel, "The
application has been referred
to the Board.. Please provide
written responses to the
questions included in the
Confidential Annex, within
eight business days from the
date of this letter." All
questions sealed
Still at 1
pm on Nov 6, notice of the
application was still not on
the Fed's website. Inner City
Press raised just this to
Governor Michelle Bowman at
the FRBKC's hearing on EGRPRA
on October 30. Watch this
site.
Fair
Finance Watch filed:
Dear
FRB Chair Powell, Comptroller
Gould:
Fair
Finance Watch has long been
concerned about Fifth
Third. Fair Finance
Watch has reviewed the
just-released 2024 Home
Mortgage Disclosure Act data
of Fifth Third, not reviewed
in any Community Reinvestment
Act performance
evaluation.
In state
after state, Fifth Third for
African Americans has (many)
more denials than
originations, while the
opposite is true for white
borrows. The pattern is
striking, starting with two
states Fifth Third and
Comerica overlap
in:
In
Michigan, the state Comerica
abandoned for Texas, Fifth
Third in 2024 denied 249
applications from African
Americans while making fewer,
only 177loans - while it made
fully 4189 loans to whites and
denied only 1688 applications.
This is disparate [there
are more states]
Inner City
Press, which has opposed the
FDIC's moves to close itself
to public scrutiny - American
Banker op-ed here
- has now submitted FOIA
requests on all this. The FDIC
said it will eliminate public
notices because it does not
receive enough public
comments. That is changing,
starting now. Watch this site.
***
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