FDIC Doubling Bank Fees to Pay for Increased Takeovers

FDIC to double bank fees in face of $40bn loss

The Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation yesterday proposed doubling the fees it charges US banks, as it warned that it faced about $40bn in losses from bank failures in the coming years.

About 90 per cent of US banks will see their basic deposit insurance fees double in the first quarter of 2009, from between 5 cents and 7 cents for each $100 of deposits to between 12 cents and 14 cents, according to a plan laid out yesterday by the FDIC, a government-backed agency that insures consumer deposits up to $250,000. From the second quarter that range would widen to from 10 to 14 cents per $100.

Banks with the riskiest profiles could end up paying fees as high as 77.5 cents for every $100 of insured deposits under the plan, compared with a maximum of 43 cents under the current structure.

The FDIC insures bank deposits with fees charged to banks. The recent increase of the FDIC Limit to $250,000 seems to indicate that taxpayers will now pay for any costs for covering above $100,000 per account-holder (which I think is a mistake – the fund should be self supporting). But this increase in fees is to restore the fund to the minimum capital requirements of the insurance fund.

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