How Do I Sign Oklahoma Banking Word

How do i industry sign banking oklahoma word safe

hi I'm Don McCoy I'm a business news reporter with the Oklahoman and I'm joined today by Roger beverage Roger is the chief executive officer and president of the Oklahoma Bankers Association which is an advocacy group for the banking industry here in Oklahoma yes community bankers and there's been a lot of news lately about banking most of it hasn't been good news and I know I've heard a little bit from some bankers in Oklahoma who haven't been entirely pleased with some of the national coverage I assume you've gotten an earful as well what is it that these local bankers are kind of upset about with the the tone and the tenor of the coverage lately well Don the the the primary thing that I think upsets Oklahoma bankers is the national media tends to lump any financial services entity into a generic category that they call a bank and consumers sometimes get confused thinking that if Merrill Lynch or Bear Stearns is a bank that must mean it's just like my bank down the street here and wherever it might be go Tebow or overt or wherever and the fact is those are specialized investment banks and investment brokers and they aren't anything like the banks in Oklahoma for the most part banks in Oklahoma are doing exceptionally well right now as a function of the state's economy which is performing very well and so one of the things I hear from bankers is what if anything can we do to put out the good word about where Oklahoma banking is today compared to what you read about in the national press or hear about on television so that's kind of what I suspect you're hearing as well right and I guess the banks the banks that are similar to the banks that we're familiar with the retail banks in Oklahoma the ones that are having trouble are the ones in areas regions of the countries where they are particularly hard hit by the subprime mortgage and right and those sorts of deals we haven't hit us quite as hard there's a handful of states California Nevada Arizona Florida those states were hit hard by the speculation that was involved in subprime lending and development other states like Ohio Indiana and Michigan are having real-estate problems in part because their local economies are not doing as well as other states Oklahoma isn't in either one of those categories in fact it's just the reverse of what you read about in some of those states particularly with respect to real estate and our real estate has done exceptionally well here in Oklahoma and continues to be well below what it is in other states in terms of both price and value it's it's amazing what you can buy in Oklahoma for a home today and it's been that way for the past several years in Oklahoma banks of course have enjoyed a good run just like other banks but there were reflection of the economy as I said earlier and as long as the economy continues to perform well Oklahoma banks are basically going to be alright yeah but I guess and the Oklahoma banks are coming off a period one of their best periods just in the last few years they've really been doing well it seems like things are a little tougher now they are they are and part of that is a reaction to the subprime crisis and the real estate meltdown if you will in those states that I mentioned and how that plays out from an examination perspective a lot of banking is based on perception and Trust a lot of it happens because people think the system works and I know that may sound a little different but the whole system is based on the assumption that your checks going to clear and that the cards going to be good and that the debit card withdrawal is going to be honored no problem when you have an exception that happens a bounced check for example or not enough money to honor a debit card that's when things kick in and Oklahoma has hummed along they've never gone up as high as some of their counterparts in other states and they're still much further above we're their counterparts are in most states Oklahoma and Texas are probably two of the best states in the country well we recently had this FDIC coming in and taking over the IndyMac Bank out in California which was clearly a victim of the holes subprime and these jumbo mortgages that they were trying to guarantee but anytime something like that happens I know bankers phones start ringing even here in Oklahoma sure what should I be doing well what's what's some advice you would give it to consumers the first thing I'd say to consumers is that even if you banked at IndyMac don't worry about anything because nothing's safer than money in the bank your money is insured it's protected up to $100,000 and we can talk about various ways to structure beyond the hundred thousand dollars in coverage if it's a retirement account it's up to two hundred and fifty thousand but that's the first thing I'd say to any consumer out there about gosh is my money safe because that's what people want to know they might protect it absolutely and you don't have to worry about it in Oklahoma all you have to remember is that nothing is safer than money in the bank period now that having been said what can they look for they can look for the kind of service they get from the bank people that know what they're doing and take care of their customers are likely to be much better run and financially sound than somebody who just kind of operates out of a fly-by-night storefront somewhere and if you've been around for a while the chances are that you're going to be a lot better off dealing with somebody that has been around for a while as opposed to somebody that just opened up in a storefront those are the kind of things that you can go to public websites like the FDIC find information out about a particular bank you can find out about their capital levels and that's important because capital is really a buffer between any bad loans and the depositors money and Oklahoma banks hold over five billion dollars in capital right now it's 1.5 trillion nationwide but five billion in Oklahoma and that's a good sign we don't have any banks on the problem list and I'm aware of I could go through the books and tell you where there might be a particular problem but for the most part our banks are doing exceptionally well the average return on assets is not at a record level but it's still solid at 1.3 percent the benchmark is one capital benchmark is roughly 6% Oklahoma banks are at 9.40 percent something like that yeah it's generally pretty positive very good well and I guess one thing you could probably mention too I think most of the bankers I've talked to they don't mind the customers calling in absolutely and asking questions if they have any questions call your banker and as he said also fdic.gov is a great place for consumer information they have a whole separate website there so that's a great you can get information on the state's banks the Regents banks or on a specific thing and you can and the most important thing for a consumer to remember about looking at those numbers is to trend it over time all a call report number is is just a snapshot on that particular day and what makes what makes it more relevant is when you look at what it's been doing over the course of the last couple of years or so and if you do that I think almost without exception in Oklahoma you're gonna find that the banks here are doing exceptionally well and much much better than their colleagues in other states okay well listen Roger thanks for all the information you been preciate you coming in you can read more on news ok.com and also in the Oklahoman in the business section and I appreciate your viewing today thank you