Wall Street Journal
Big banks are ramping up efforts to retain and promote women leaders, the paper reports. The article takes a look at initiatives including a Citigroup symposium that brought together 50 senior women to discuss ways to improve gender diversity and Morgan Stanley’s attempt to get more male managers involved in its development program for women at the vice president level. Whether these programs will successfully propel more women into the C-suite remains to be seen, as many are relatively new.
Many smaller retailers are in for an unhappy surprise in the aftermath of Thursday’s deadline for compliance with a new chip-card policy, according to the paper. Liability for credit- and debit-card fraud will shift on Thursday from banks to merchants who have neglected to install equipment compatible with chip cards. Just 19% of merchants will have upgraded their payment terminals by the end of the year, according to consulting firm Mercator Advisory Group.
The Consumer Financial Protection Bureau is exploring new regulations for student-loan servicers in an effort to avoid the kinds of problems that led to the mortgage crisis. Potential new requirements could require servicers to reduce some borrowers’ monthly payments and to alter their payment processing practices.
New mortgage disclosure requirements go into effect Oct. 3, and some lenders worry the adjustment period will mean “delayed closings, frustrated borrowers and confused real-estate professionals,” according to the paper.
Bank of America’s investment-banking units are laying off 200 employees in an effort to compensate for lower profits, the paper reports.
A unit of UBS Group has agreed to pay $34 million to settle charges related to the sale of troubled Puerto Rico bond funds.
The Federal Reserve’s eventual rate hike may spark a surge in deposit withdrawals as customers seek better yields from money-market funds and short-term debt, writes John Carney in “Heard on the Street.” Banks with well-padded reserves will be in the best position to cope.
Financial Times
Competition from technology firms will lead banks to start bleeding profits in some financial products over the next decade, according to a new McKinsey report. Credit cards and car loans are deemed to be particularly vulnerable.
Companies that put off digital innovation tend to pay a hefty price down the line, according to a study by Deloitte and the MIT Sloan Management Review.
New York Times
“There is no consensus on what constitutes good corporate governance,” writes law professor Steven Davidoff Solomon in considering the results of a recent shareholder vote at Bank of America. A majority of investors voted to allow B of A chief Brian Moynihan to retain the additional role of chairman, but Solomon is more concerned with the rift between pension funds and mutual funds over the form that governance should take. Going forward, Solomon suggests the two parties “focus on what works in corporate governance for a particular company by creating value, instead of just advocating whatever the conventional wisdom of the moment says is good corporate governance.”
