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New Atlanta-based company rises from Corus Bank

From the Atlanta Business Chronicle | A new Atlanta-based real estate company will market the assets and loans from Chicago’s failed Corus Bank.

Midwest Banc Holdings files for bankruptcy

Midwest Banc Holdings Inc. filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection Tuesday, listing $9.7 million in assets and $144.7 million in debt in a filing in U.S. Bankruptcy Court in Chicago.

SEC charges 2 with insider trading on BHP-Potash

Federal regulators say two Spanish investors made illegal profits of $1.1 million by trading on secret information about BHP Billiton PLC’s bid to acquire Potash Corp. The Securities and Exchange Commission said Juan Jose Fernandez Garcia and Luis Martin Caro Sanchez bought investments that became valuable after the mining company offered $38.5 billion to take over fertilizer maker Potash. Garcia heads the research arm of a bank that was advising BHP on the deal.

Report: Politics not behind Broadway Bank seizure

There is no evidence that politics played a role in the government seizure of a Chicago bank owned by the family of the Democratic nominee running for the U.S. Senate seat once held by President Barack Obama, a government watchdog said this week.

On April 23, bank regulators seized Broadway Bank, a community bank with $1.2 billion in assets, and the Federal Deposit Insurance Corp arranged for MB Financial Inc. to assume its deposits.

The move then became embroiled in this year’s campaign season because the bank was owned by the family of Alexi Giannoulias, the first-term Illinois state treasurer and the Democratic nominee in this year’s U.S. Senate race. Get the full story »

SEC: Mozilo OK’d Countrywide preferential loans

Federal regulators say former Countrywide CEO Angelo Mozilo personally approved mortgages for favored borrowers that violated the company’s policies and lending standards.

The Securities and Exchange Commission had previously accused Mozilo of civil fraud and illegal insider trading. Now, the agency says Mozilo played a direct role in a program for preferential borrowers that has been the focus of congressional ethics inquiries. Get the full story »

Savings rates drop below 1%

The national average rate for checking, savings and other deposit products has dropped below 1 percent for the first time in at least a decade, according to an analysis released Monday by Market Rates Insight.

The survey also includes money-market accounts and certificates of deposit.

In July  2010, the national average rate was 0.99 percent, Market Rates found. The closest dip in deposit rates occurred in January 2004, when the national average rate was 1.88 percent. Get the full story »

ShoreBank Pacific acquired

OneCalifornia Bank said it reached a deal to buy ShoreBank Pacific, which is owned by Chicago-based ShoreBank but was not part of Friday’s seizure by the Federal Deposit Insurance Corp.

Fed’s Hoenig: ‘Too big to fail” hurts small banks

The viability of community banks is threatened by policies that have conferred “too big to fail” status on larger banks, reducing their cost of capital, Kansas City Federal Reserve Bank President Thomas Hoenig said on Monday.

Hoenig, in prepared testimony to a field hearing of the U.S. House of Representatives Subcommittee on Oversight and Investigations here, said the community bank model was still viable, especially if allowed to compete on an equal footing with larger banks. Get the full story »

Credit card rates hit highest level in 9 years

(Getty Images)

(Tim Sloan/AFP/Getty Images)

Interest rates continue to tumble for the U.S. Treasury, companies and home buyers alike. But for a large portion of 381 million U.S. credit-card accounts, borrowing rates have been moving only one way: up.

And average rates are likely to climb further soon. New credit-card rules that took effect Sunday limit banks’ ability to charge penalty fees. They come on top of rule changes earlier this year restricting issuers’ ability to adjust rates on the fly. Issuers responded by pushing card rates to their highest level in nine years. Get the full story »

ShoreBank shut down by FDIC

An exterior view of ShoreBank at 3401 S. King Drive on the South Side, May 18, 2010. (Chris Walker/Chicago Tribune)

ShoreBank, which billed itself as the nation’s first and leading community development and environmental lender, failed Friday and was acquired by a consortium of big banks, insurers, philanthropic groups and civic-minded individuals.

ShoreBank is the 15th Illinois lender to fail this year, and the 114th to be seized by regulators nationally.

Its failure is expected to cost the Federal Deposit Insurance Corp. $367.7 million. The FDIC is funded by the banking industry. Get the full story »

Amcore Financial files for Chapter 11 bankruptcy

Troubled lender Amcore Financial Inc AMFI.PK filed for bankruptcy protection on Thursday to liquidate its assets, it said in a filing.

Amcore Financial, which has been in talks with its largest stakeholders, intends to file a plan of liquidation by August 24 and continues to operate its business as a debtor-in-possession, it said in a filing with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission. Get the full story »

Farrow reported to head reconstituted ShoreBank

The group seeking to buy ShoreBank, the ailing South Side lender expected to be seized by federal regulators Friday, plans to name former First Chicago executive Bill Farrow as the chief executive and president of the institution if it succeeds at bidding for certain assets and deposits of the failing bank.

It means that three former First Chicago executives will be running the show if their bid succeeds. Get the full story »

BofA, Lewis deny charges in Merrill Lynch deal

Bank of America Corp. and former Chief Executive Kenneth Lewis denied civil fraud charges brought by New York’s attorney general over the bank’s takeover of Merrill Lynch & Co. amid the 2008 financial crisis.

In court papers filed Wednesday, Lewis said the state’s prosecutor Andrew Cuomo had no basis in his lawsuit to allege a conspiracy to mislead the public and shareholders about Merrill’s deteriorating finances and Bank of America’s desire for government assistance. Get the full story »

ShoreBank failure 50-50, Fox reports

Officials at troubled ShoreBank see the odds as 50-50 that the lender will fail and be taken over by the government.

FDIC seeks to block Corus parent from tax refunds

The Federal Deposit Insurance Corp. is seeking to block the parent of failed Corus Bank from recouping more than $257 million in tax refunds stemming from the bank’s collapse.

In papers filed Monday with the U.S. Bankruptcy in Chicago, the FDIC, the receiver of the closed Illinois bank, said Corus Bankshares Inc.’s lawsuit against the regulator that seeks to take back those refunds should be tossed out because it intentionally sidesteps federal banking laws.

“Because federal law expressly precludes” the lawsuit Bankshares filed in bankruptcy court, “this action should be dismissed,” the FDIC said in court papers. Get the full story »