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The FDIC, Federal Reserve Board, NCUA, OCC and state financial regulators have issued an interagency statement on supervisory practices regarding financial institutions affected by Hurricane Helene. These agencies recognize the serious impact of Hurricane Helene on the customers and operations of many financial institutions and will provide appropriate regulatory assistance to affected institutions subject to their supervision. The agencies encourage institutions operating in the affected areas to meet the financial services needs of their communities.

The statement addressed agency views on lending, temporary facilities, publishing requirements, regulatory reporting requirements, and potential CRA consideration for certain financial institutions' efforts.

For more information, refer to the Interagency Supervisory Examiner Guidance for Institutions Affected by a Major Disaster, which is available as follows:

• State Financial Regulators
• FDIC
• FRB
• OCC
• NCUA

The NMLS has posted a reminder that the NMLS annual renewal period begins November 1 (and ends December 31). All MLO institutions must renew their registrations in NMLS in that two-month period, and individual mortgage loan originators actively registered before July 1, 2024, must be renewed for 2025. The NMLS provides details on its Renew-Reactive page.

The CFPB yesterday issued an Advisory Opinion on "Debt Collection Practices (Regulation F); Deceptive and Unfair Collection of Medical Debt," to prevent families from being targeted by illegal medical debt collection tactics. The advisory opinion clarifies that debt collectors, which may include third-party “revenue cycle management” companies, are violating federal law when they collect on inaccurate or legally invalid medical debts. These illegal practices include double-dipping to get paid for services already covered by insurance, hounding consumers to pay fake or exaggerated charges, misrepresenting consumers’ rights to contest bills, and collecting on debts without documentation that the amount is actually owed. The CFPB’s action aims to protect consumers from careless or predatory practices that can lead to inflated healthcare costs.

• CFPB press release
• Publication update: Published in the Federal Register at 89 FR 80715 on 10/4/2024, with applicability from 12/3/2024.

The FDIC yesterday issued FIL-70-2024 with guidance to help financial institutions and facilitate recovery in areas affected by Hurricane Helene in Florida, Georgia, North Carolina, and South Carolina, on September 23, 2024, and continuing.

The OCC yesterday released CRA evaluations for 21 national banks and federal savings associations that were made public in September. Sixteen of the evaluations are rated satisfactory. We congratulate the remaining five institutions, whose evaluations received outstanding ratings:

• Capital Bank, National Association, Rockville, MD
• First FS&LA of Valdosta, Valdosta, GA
• First National Bank of Gillette, Gillette, WY
• First National Bank of Pulaski, Pulaski, TN
• Presidential Bank, FSB, Bethesda, MD

The OCC has released its bank supervision operating plan for fiscal year (FY) 2025. The plan outlines the OCC’s supervision priorities and objectives for the year. It also facilitates the implementation of supervisory strategies for individual national banks, federal savings associations, federal branches and agencies of foreign banking organizations, and third-party service providers subject to OCC examination. OCC staff uses this plan to guide its supervisory priorities, planning, and resource allocations.

Heightened focus areas include:

• Financial
  • Credit
  • Allowance for credit losses
  • Asset and liability management
  • Capital
  • Climate-related financial risks for banks with over $100 billion in total consolidated assets
• Operational
  • Cybersecurity
  • Enterprise change management
  • Operations
  • Third-party risks
  • Payments
• Compliance
  • Bank Secrecy Act/anti-money laundering/countering the financing of terrorism and Office of Foreign Assets Control
  • Consumer compliance
  • Community Reinvestment Act
  • Fair lending

The U.S. Small Business Administration has published [89 FR 79734] in today's Federal Register a Direct Final Rule amending regulations governing SBA's 504 Loan Program for debt refinancing with expansion and debt refinancing without expansion. The changes will streamline the loan application process, expand eligibility criteria for small businesses borrowers, and make minor corrections. The amendments include: removing the 50% cap on debt refinance without expansion to conform with current legislation; raising the loan to value requirement on debt refinancing without expansion projects that include other business expenses to 90% and eliminating the cap on Eligible Business Expenses; aligning the “substantially all” standard for 504 debt refinancing with expansion so it is consistent with the debt refinancing without expansion standard of 75%; eliminating the 10% substantial benefit test on 504 debt refinancing with expansion and 504 debt refinancing without expansion on refinancing other government debt; and allowing certain “other secured debt” to be included as an Eligible Business Expense.

The rule will become effective November 15, 2024. SBA must receive comments on this direct final rule on or before October 31, 2024. If adverse comment is received, SBA will publish a timely withdrawal of the rule in the Federal Register.

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The Federal Housing Finance Agency yesterday announced a proposed rule on Unsecured Credit Limits for Federal Home Loan Banks.

The proposed rule would improve the FHLBanks’ ability to provide liquidity to members by aligning the treatment of interest-bearing deposit accounts (IBDAs) and other authorized overnight investments with the treatment of Federal Funds sales. This updated regulatory treatment would allow the FHLBanks to better manage and respond to the intraday liquidity needs of their members. The proposed rule also clarifies terms for the FHLBanks to determine limits on unsecured credit to counterparties.

The FHFA will accept public comments on the proposed rule for 60 days following its publication in the Federal Register.

The FHFA has announced it has updated the National Mortgage Database (NMDB®) Aggregate Statistics series to include new quarterly data on the loan performance of residential mortgages through the second quarter of 2024. The Agency also released a new interactive data visualization dashboard tool that enables users to more easily access the loan performance data.

Highlights of the quarterly data include—

• 0.1 percent of all outstanding mortgages were in the process of foreclosure, bankruptcy, or deed-in-lieu at the end of the second quarter of 2024. This level is unchanged from recent quarters and well below the high of 3.5 percent reached in the fourth quarter of 2010 and first quarter of 2011.
• An additional 0.6 percent of all outstanding mortgages were 90 days or more past due but not in a foreclosure, bankruptcy, or deed-in-lieu process. Louisiana (1.3%), Mississippi (1.1%), and the District of Columbia (1.1%) have the highest share of loans 90 days or more past due.
• 0.6 percent of all outstanding loans were in forbearance at the end of the second quarter of 2024. The metropolitan areas with the highest forbearance rates are Dallas-Plano-Irving, TX (5.3%), Louisville-Jefferson County, KY-IN (4.7%), and Houston-The Woodlands-Sugar Land, TX (3.7%).

The FDIC has issued guidance to help banks and facilitate recovery in areas of Georgia (FIL-68-2024) and Vermont (FIL-69-2024) affected by severe weather.