The Banker Next Door

Bank M&A Update 1Q 2026

Bank M&A activity started 2026 doing okay. Not lighting the world on fire, not bad, just okay. Deal volume in 1Q 2026 slowed to the same level as 1Q 2025 with 36 and 35 transactions respectively. Bank CEOs and executives agree that the window for M&A is still open but geopolitical problems are slowing things down. Many bank CEOs were questioned about potential mergers on 1Q earnings calls. Many emphatically shut down any suggestion of a potential merger. There have been rumors around Citibank needing to purchase a regional bank to bolster their deposit base in the U.S. There are regional banks such as Truist and PNC that could either be targets or on the hunt. Additionally, worldwide M&A activity was strong in the 1Q 2026, within 11 deals with transaction values over $10 billion. Total transaction value of $305 billion was the best since the 2Q of 2019. This episode reviewed multiple articles from S&P Global Market Intelligence and Banking Dive.

Review of FDIC State Profiles for 4Q 2025

The FDIC released their state profiles for the 4th quarter of 2025. This series provides quarterly summaries of banking and economic conditions for each state. The FDIC website has a chart of the entire U.S. Click on the state you would like to view, and it gives you a 1-page PDF. Each profile includes the following categories: economic indicators, banking trends, and banking profile. A link to the FDIC website is included below.
Link:  FDIC State Profiles | FDIC.gov

BND: Strategy Room Bonus - Is it time to reign in AI?

This video is a clip from BND: Strategy Room Live Stream on April 18, 2026. David Sacks, who was the White House AI and crypto czar, has become co-chair of the tech advisory council expanding his role. Mr. Sacks has advocated the White House barrel forward with AI development completely disregarding any associated risks. Last week, Scott Bessent and Jerome Powell called an emergency meeting with every major bank CEO to discuss Anthropic’s new AI system Mythos. Mythos has the White House extremely worried because it finds bugs in older software at alarming rates. These bugs would allow hackers to get into company’s systems and cause an extreme amount of damage. The White House is now scrambling to head off this threat. Anthropic CEO Dario Amodei was summoned to the White House on Friday to meet with Chief of Staff Susie Wiles. All this is happening as Gen Z grows more skeptical and angrier about AI. This all beckons the question, should AI be reigned in?

BND: Strategy Room 4-18-2026

The Banker Next Door (BND) weekly live stream show. Strategy Room provides financial news, commentary, top stories in the business world, economic indicators, and all things banking for the week.

BND: Strategy Room Bonus - Has Private Credit infected insurance companies?

This video is a clip from BND: Strategy Room Live Stream on April 11, 2026. Insurance regulators are concerned about the amount of money major insurance companies have invested in the Private Credit market. In addition, insurance companies may have inflated the valuations of those investments. Where have we seen this before? We also review other related Private Credit news of the week.

Bitcoin rebound, Strategy losses, & Iran crypto economy (Crypto Series Part XXXIX)

This is part 39 of the crypto series. In this episode we examine Bitcoins performance over the last month through a chart and multiple articles. Has Bitcoin found a new resistance level? Will it see continued increases? Has Satoshi Nakamoto been found? Coinbase receives conditional approval from the OCC for a bank trust charter. Franklin Templeton acquires crypto firm 250 Digital to be included in their new Franklin Crypto unit. PayPal, Convera, and Nium are racing to incorporate stablecoins in cross-boarder plays. Strategy purchases an additional $1 billion in Bitcoin after posting a $14.5 billion unrealized loss in the 1st quarter of 2026. Iran’s crypto economy has increased to approximately $7.8 billion as crypto and stablecoin have aided both their citizens and the regime. FDIC sets stablecoin standard for banks. White House Economic Council downplays stablecoin threat on bank deposits in new report. This episode examined multiple articles from The Epoch Times, The Wall Street Journal, S&P Global, Investopedia, CNBC, and Coinbase.  

Review of Bank Director's 2026 Risk Survey

Bank Director has released their 2026 Risk Survey. Key findings from the survey include regulatory risk recedes, examiners are learning on the job, cybersecurity oversight, identifying cybersecurity gaps, credit risk concerns, and risk responsibility. Bank are feeling better about being overburdened by bank regulators. They also feel like new bank examiners are inexperienced. Less than 50% of bank board’s brought in an outside cybersecurity expert to learn from. 89% of banks did conduct a tabletop exercise of their cybersecurity incident response plan. Overall credit and commercial real estate were top concerns this year. 54% of banks surveyed employ a Chief Risk Officer (CRO).  This episode reviewed an article from Bank Director titled “2026 Risk Survey: AI exposes threats, knowledge gaps” and the 2026 Risk Survey report. Links to both are included below.  
Link: 2026 Risk Survey: AI Exposes Threats, Knowledge Gaps | Bank Director
Link: 2026-Risk-Report-Open.pdf

Review of JPMorgan CEO Jamie Dimon's annual letter to shareholders

JPMorgan Chase CEO Jamie Dimon released his 2025 letter to shareholders as part of the bank’s annual report. Mr. Dimon listed five main concerns which include inflation, intensifying competition, Americans’ loss of trust in government, artificial intelligence, and weak allies. Mr. Dimon was critical of Basel III and G-SIB proposals from regulators. In addition, Mr. Dimon has concerns about Private Credit, but notes that even if losses are elevated through the next credit cycle they will not rise to the level of being a systemic problem. This episode reviewed JPMorgan Chase CEO Jamie Dimon’s annual letter to shareholders. A link to the website is included below.  
Link: Jamie Dimon's Letter to Shareholders, Annual Report 2025 | JPMorganChase

Remembering Frédéric Bastiat

Frédéric Bastiat (1801-1850) was a French provincial scholar.  As a young man, Bastiat was heavily influence by Adam Smith and Benjamin Franklin. He developed profound beliefs in life, liberty, and property rights. His greatest work is a book simply called “The Law”, which was published just before his death in 1850. Bastiat’s grandfather passed away in 1825 leaving him the family estate. He became a gentleman farmer and part-time scholar. Over the next twenty years Bastiat would write many articles, papers, and books. He also got involved in public life. In 1831, he was elected a justice of the peace. In 1848, he was elected as a deputy to the National Assembly. He would serve until his death in 1850 of Tuberculosis. This episode reviewed an article from The Epoch Times (subscription required) titled the life of Frédéric Bastiat.
“Life, liberty, and property do not exist because men have made laws. On the contrary, it was the fact that life, liberty, and property existed beforehand that caused men to make laws in the first place.” – Frédéric Bastiat, The Law

Do you suffer from sunk cost fallacy?

The sunk cost fallacy is a mindset of continuing onward with an investment or project based on past information even though logic dictates that the outcome will not be favorable. Even when we are faced with flawed reasoning, human nature will not allow us to change course because of aversion to waste and the need to be right. The sunk cost fallacy can occur in both business and government. The sunk cost fallacy emanates from a sunk cost expense, which is a lost amount of time, money, or effect, that cannot be regained. Behavioral economics tells us that the foundation of sunk cost fallacy is psychological and tied to several biases which include loss aversion, commitment bias, and endowment effect. This episode reviewed articles from Investopedia and The Epoch Times (subscription required).