The average is more than three banks a week, failing and being seized by federal regulators. Three more were closed overnight. (via AP)
It happens overnight, when no customers are present. After troubled banks close their doors on Friday afternoon, the FDIC moves in, seizes control, and restructures the bank by morning. It happened again just last night, with three banks temporarily shuttered in Florida, Georgia and New Mexico.
The FDIC took over Peninsula Bank, with $644 million in assets and $580 million in deposits; First National Bank with $252 million in assets and $231 in deposits; and High Desert State Bank with $80 million in assets and $81 million in deposits.
After 140 bank failures last year, 2010 is on track to easily surpass that mark. And there may be even more gloom on the horizon: The AP cites 775 banks as being on the FDIC’s confidential “problem” list. As fears of a double-dip recession mount, the growing number of bank failures is anything but reassuring news.