FDIC Expects More Bank Failures

The Federal Deposit Insurance Corp. (FDIC) expects a lot more banks to fail, costing the agency billions of dollars. Earlier this week the agency said it had 702 banks on its ”problem list” at the end of December, up from 552 at the end of September.

All of those banks aren’t necessarily going to fail, but bank failures are expected to reach a high point this year. Total assets of the troubled banks rose during the quarter to $402.8 billion from $345.9 billion. The FDIC did not release the names of the 702 troubled banks.

The agency says it has cash and marketable securities that total $66 billion. The FDIC required most insured banks to prepay about three years worth of deposit insurance premiums at the end of 2009 to help provide funds needed to handle bank failures this year and into the future. Those prepayments totaled $46 million.

Last year 140 banks failed, the highest number since 1992. You can search for failed banks here.

The FDIC is an independent federal agency that was created in 1933. When banks have failed, the agency has helped insured depositors recover their funds promptly. You can find out if your accounts are fully insured by the FDIC in case of a bank failure.

No Comments »

No comments yet.

RSS feed for comments on this post. TrackBack URL

Leave a comment