Rebel Traders – Analysis Without The Hype

Today the Federal deposit Insurance Company released the latest quarterly banking profile. There is much information contained within this latest report and I will highlight the important parts for you here:

The most important revelation is that the Deposit Insurance Fund (DIF), the money available to pay back customers at failed banks, has dropped to a record low.

The Deposit Insurance Fund (DIF) decreased by $12.6 billion during the fourth quarter to a negative $20.9 billion (unaudited) primarily because of $17.8 billion in additional provisions for bank failures. Also, unrealized losses on available-for-sale securities combined with operating expenses reduced the fund by $692 million. Accrued assessment income added $3.1 billion to the fund during the quarter, and interest earned, combined with termination fees on loss share guarantees and surcharges from the Temporary Liquidity Guarantee Program added $2.8 billion. For the year, the fund balance shrank by $38.1 billion, compared to a $35.1 billion decrease in 2008.

The DIF’s reserve ratio was negative 0.39 percent on December 31, 2009, down from negative 0.16 percent on September 30, 2009, and 0.36 percent a year ago. The December 31, 2009, reserve ratio is the lowest reserve ratio for a combined bank and thrift insurance fund on record.

In layman’s terms, the FDIC is in the hole by nearly $21 Billion, and it is very likely that they are tapping their $500 Billion credit agreement with the US.Treasury taxpayers.

The number of banking institutions that the FDIC has identified as ‘problem institutions’ has risen once again and now stands at 702 with assets of $403 Billion. If there is $403 Billion in assets recognized as being contained in problem banks, and the insurance fund is negative $21 Billion then where will the money come from to pay our insurance claims when these banks fail? Taxpayers, that’s where.

The FDIC also reported that loan losses rose for the 12th consecutive quarter.

Asset quality indicators worsened in the fourth quarter. Net charge-offs (NCOs) totaled $53.0 billion, an increase of $14.4 billion (37.2 percent) over the same period in 2008. The annualized net charge-off rate rose to 2.89 percent, up from 1.95 percent a year earlier and 2.72 percent in the third quarter of 2009. This is the highest quarterly NCO rate reported by the industry in the 26 years for which quarterly NCO data are available. […]

Noncurrent loans still growing

Noncurrent loans and leases continued to rise through the end of the year, with a few notable exceptions. The total amount of loans and leases that were noncurrent (90 days or more past due or in nonaccrual status) increased by $24.3 billion (6.6 percent) in the fourth quarter, to $391.3 billion, or 5.37 percent of all loans and leases at yearend. This is the highest level for the industry’s noncurrent rate in the 26 years that all insured institutions have reported noncurrent loan data. The increase in noncurrent loans in the quarter was largely driven by noncurrent residential mortgage loans, which rose by $23.2 billion (14.9 percent).[…]

All in all the FDIC looks to be in sad shape. Expect to see FDIC Chairwoman Shelia Bair to be before Congress again this year trying to explain why it is that the insurance fund is broke and what she is going to do about it.

The cash reserves needed for the FDIC to keep paying depositors at failed banks has all been used up. Don’t panic (yet anyways), the FDIC has an open credit line to the Treasury Department (uh, that means us tax payers) that will keep the FDIC floating in cash to keep paying out money to Grandma and Grandpa at the failed banks.

You see, the FDIC is supposed to be self maintaining, it charges banks a fee to have their deposits insured. Think of it as the banks paying an insurance premium. That money goes into the FDIC kitty and is used to pay depositors when a bank fails. That is all well and good except when the financial system blows up like it has over the past 2 years.

As of today’s quarterly report issued by the FDIC they are now broke, and I mean that in the literal sense.

FDIC deposit insurance fund now -$8.2B v $10.4B last quarter

Yep, they are broke, no money left in the cash drawer. So what now? As long as the FDIC has an open credit line with the Treasury then any bank that fails it will be the taxpayers who reimburse Grandma and Grandpa.

Think of it this way: you have a checking account at (let’s pick a name out of the air) ShittyBank and they get closed by the FDIC. Your very own money will be reimbursed to you via the FDIC insurance fund, but you will actually be paying yourself back in part because taxpayers will be on the hook to keep the FDIC floating in funds. So in the end you still lose some money.

The FDIC has recently asked member banks to pre-pay insurance premiums for the next 3 years in an attempt to fund the reserve pool as quickly as possible. But many smaller banks are objecting to this as it will further cut into their balance sheets. Besides, will prepayment of 3 years of insurance premiums be enough to cover the increase in bank failures that still lie ahead? I think not. In which case it will eventually end up in the tax payers lap.

Not only has the FDIC announced that their cash drawer is empty, but the number of banks on their hit list has grown yet again. That number now stands at 552 compared to 416 just in the previous quarter.

Recall that just a couple months ago the FDIC opened a satellite office in Florida with a staff of roughly 500 to deal with the bank issues (aka future bank failure) in the Southeast region. Expect more bank failures from Florida and surrounding states in the future.

The FDIC again publishes terrible news for the banking industry. The institutions insured by the FDIC lost about 3.7 Bn for Q2 alone. This comes as Meredith Whitney, the analyst reputed for predicting failure for Citigroup and success for GS, predicted that about 300 banks to fail by the end of 2009.

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
August 27, 2009

Commercial banks and savings institutions insured by the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation (FDIC) reported an aggregate net loss of $3.7 billion in the second quarter of 2009, a decline of $8.5 billion from the $4.8 billion in profits the industry reported in the second quarter of 2008. Insured institutions earned $424 million in net operating income during this latest quarter even after a special assessment of $5.5 billion to bolster the FDIC’s insurance fund. However, one-time losses and other items totaling $4.1 billion pulled the industry results into negative territory.

“While challenges remain, evidence is building that the U.S. economy is starting to grow again,” said FDIC Chairman Sheila Bair. “Banking industry performance is — as always — a lagging indicator. The banking industry, too, can look forward to better times ahead. But, for now, the difficult and necessary process of recognizing loan losses and cleaning up balance sheets continues to be reflected in the industry’s bottom line.”

Chairman Bair went on to say, “The FDIC was created specifically for times such as these. No matter how challenging the environment, the FDIC has ample resources to continue protecting depositors as we have for the last 75 years. No insured depositor has ever lost a penny of insured deposits…and no one ever will.”

Provisions for loan losses totaled $66.9 billion in the quarter, an increase of $16.5 billion (32.8 percent) over the second quarter of 2008. Extraordinary losses stemming from writedowns of asset-backed commercial paper totaled $3.6 billion, compared to extraordinary losses of $366 million a year earlier. Noninterest expenses were $1.7 billion (1.7 percent) higher, primarily due to increased FDIC deposit insurance premiums.

Indicators of asset quality continued to worsen during the second quarter. Both the quarterly net charge-off rate and the percentage of loans and leases that were noncurrent (90 days or more past due or in nonaccrual status) reached the highest levels registered in the 26 years that insured institutions have reported these data. Insured institutions charged off $48.9 billion in uncollectible loans during the quarter, up from $26.4 billion a year earlier, and noncurrent loans and leases increased by $40.4 billion during the second quarter. At the end of June, noncurrent loans and leases totaled $332 billion, or 4.35 percent of the industry’s total loans and leases.

“Deteriorating loan quality is having the greatest impact on industry earnings as insured institutions continue to set aside reserves to cover loan losses,” Chairman Bair noted. “Of all the major earnings components, the amount that insured institutions added to their reserves for loan losses was, by far, the largest drag on industry earnings compared to a year ago.”

All told, more than 28 percent of all insured institutions reported a net loss in the second quarter, compared with 18 percent a year earlier.

Financial results for the second quarter and first half of 2009 are contained in the FDIC’s latest Quarterly Banking Profile, which was released today. Also among the major findings:

Net interest margins improved in the quarter. The average margin (the difference between the average yield on interest-earning assets and the average interest expense of funding those assets) rose to 3.48 percent from 3.39 percent in the first quarter and 3.37 percent in the second quarter of 2008. More than half of all institutions reported higher margins than in the first quarter. Net interest income totaled $100 billion in the quarter, up from $96.6 billion a year earlier.

Net interest margins improved from the previous quarter at community banks and at larger institutions. “This is good news for community banks, since three-fourths of their revenues come from net interest income,” Chairman Bair said.

Total assets of insured institutions declined by $238 billion. A $125.5 billion decline in loan and lease balances accounted for more than half of the decline in total assets of insured institutions during the second quarter. The 1.8 percent decline in industry assets followed a $303.2 billion decline in the first quarter of 2009. Banks’ balances with Federal Reserve banks fell by $99.4 billion (20.4 percent) during the quarter, and assets in trading accounts declined by $65.5 billion (7.9 percent). The industry’s investment securities portfolio increased by $130.6 billion (5.9 percent).

The number of institutions on the FDIC’s “Problem List” rose. At the end of June, there were 416 insured institutions on the “Problem List,” up from 305 on March 31. This is the largest number of institutions on the list since June 30, 1994, when there were 434 institutions on the list. Total assets of “problem” institutions increased during the quarter from $220.0 billion to $299.8 billion, the highest level since December 31, 1993.

Total reserves of the Deposit Insurance Fund (DIF) stood at $42 billion. Just as insured institutions reserve for loan losses, the FDIC has to provide for a contingent loss reserve for future failures. To the extent that the FDIC has already reserved for an anticipated closing, the failure of an institution does not reduce the DIF balance. The contingent loss reserve, which totaled $28.5 billion on March 31, rose to $32.0 billion as of June 30, reflecting higher actual and anticipated losses from failed institutions. Additions to the contingent loss reserve during the second quarter caused the fund balance to decline from $13.0 billion to $10.4 billion. Combined, the total reserves of the DIF equaled $42.4 billion at the end of the quarter.

Chairman Bair distinguished the DIF’s reserves from the FDIC’s cash resources, which included $22 billion of cash and U.S. Treasury securities held as of June 30, as well as the ability to borrow up to $500 billion from the Treasury. “A decline in the fund balance does not diminish our ability to protect insured depositors,” Chairman Bair concluded.