FNB failure a big blow

Posted by

in Opinion

Sunday, November 7. 2010

Comments (35)

By Walter Geiger

There have been so many bank failures in Georgia and elsewhere around the country in recent months that we all have become somewhat conditioned to them. But, when one of two banks in your hometown fails, the severity of the blow is so readily apparent – the aftershocks so intense – one worries for the future of the community and the entire country.

Please login or register to read the rest of this story.

Trackbacks

Trackback specific URI for this entry

No Trackbacks

Comments

Display comments as (Linear | Threaded)

#1 bankalchemist on 11/07/10 at 09:01 AM

The immediate cause of failure will most likely be an over concentration of real estate. But the underlying cause which drove to this fate is in a declining interest rate environment where the single source of income for a bank of this tenure is its net interest margin it tends to bulk up in changing times with fee rich construction loans to developers who have little at risk themselves. This bank like many lost sight of C&L lending or fee income from commerce it could help its 6000 customers develop as the did not need to be sold they were already there. But when Bank Management is not tested or follows what is the easy solution or the one most present in the end the bank can not dodge a cyclical turn of events in the market. Bankers are usually the last to adapt or adopt and are not adept in new methods of earning profits as their larger competitors are. In a round about way its the law of natural selection that the strongest will survive overtime. bankalchemist.

#2 Anonymous on 11/07/10 at 09:45 AM

The local government is no friend to commerce or business. The real problem starts at the bottom. This will all be revealed soon.

#3 Beavis on 11/07/10 at 11:59 AM

Uhhh, huh huh, you said "big blow"

#4 H B on 11/07/10 at 01:08 PM

Walter your article was excellent. However I feel it goes beyond alot of the quick information we received on the demise of the bank. I think when the dust settles it will go beyond real estate losses, and include how real estate loans were processed and what was required to get a loan. How liberal was management?
I am sure an audit will reflect alot of information that will enlighten us on this disaster.

#5 Anonymous on 11/08/10 at 05:28 AM

Walter said, “Certainly, our government as it is currently operated is no friend to business large or small.
We have a president in the White House who has openly admitted his hatred of our free enterprise system.”
On the contrary, I don’t call the bail out of the major institutions as be unfriendly to big business. This was the greatest heist the modern world has ever known. All the present administration demands is sound business practices and those who don’t will and should be shut down. The American people must not be held financially hostage to the greed of big or small business.

#6 Sorry to tell you on 11/08/10 at 06:41 AM

FNB has been in trouble for a long time. They had incompetent people running the place and frankly I'm surprised it did not happen earlier. Correct me if I'm wrong, but they had already been in trouble with the FDIC and they couldn't even hold it together when they merged with the FNB of Griffin, Griffin saw that the upper management of Barnesville need a few changes and rather than do that they broke off the merger.

Basically when you allow incompetent run your finances you deserver to have it all disappear

#7 Anonymous on 11/08/10 at 07:23 AM

Loans were made to good people, and at the time the credit was right and the people had a job and could pay the loans. Then all this crap started and people lost their jobs and could not repay the loans. This has nothing to do with the fact that FNB made bad loans it has everything to do with the fact that people lost their jobs and had no income. So before people go around pointing fingers at the bank saying they did a bad job get your facts right first. Also when everything was going good the banks were made to give loans to people that they would other wise not because the government made them do it. And now they are coming back saying that they shouldnt have. Your are damned if you do and damned if you dont.

#8 Anonymous on 11/08/10 at 09:14 AM

I always thought sound banking required collateral not just a job and a promise.

#9 H B on 11/08/10 at 09:37 AM

4.1 you must be of the Banks Management. You are very defensive of facts that have been know for some time. I am sure if you looked into the mirror you would realize what has happened. Read no. 6, that may enlighten you.

#10 Anonymous on 11/08/10 at 09:50 AM

Real estate might be a problem but the banks certainly are not innocent. Yes they foreclose in the sunshine but then climb under a rock and purchase their own foreclosed homes for pennies. Then they cry about losses to collect government bailouts from the taxpayer. Now they have revenue to loan and property to sell. It’s called double dipping and lining your pockets.

#11 Anonymous on 11/08/10 at 10:38 AM

Bad economy. Big government. Too many foreclosure homes. 800 million jobs loss. President Obama doing a bad jobs for the economy. That why? $20 trillion. or start World War 3. China, North Korea, Iran and Russia.

#12 Anonymous on 11/08/10 at 03:14 PM

No actually I am not of the bank managment. I just happen to know the things that happened. And no one has denied that the bank had problems. All I am saying is that the bank is put under certain requirments by the government and if you dont listen to them then you get in trouble for all kinds of things. If you dont work in this field then you have no grounds for saying that its all the banks fault. You have no idea of all the regulations that a bank has to follow. I am just saying we just need a little less government in our banking business

#13 Rankin Fyle on 11/08/10 at 03:34 PM

I can't imagine that the failing of FNB is much different from the 46 other banks in this Republican state to fail.A state with the higest bank failure rate in the nation. But we all know Republicans are such great free enterprising businesspeople now don't we. When you've drunk the kool aid you will succumb. And they drank gallons of it.

#14 Anonymous on 11/08/10 at 04:23 PM

Quit blaming President Obama ... you all seem to forget that the mess we are in now started and went deep on Bush's watch ...and if you think things are bad now for the working man and women, "you ain't seen nothing yet" now that the Republicans are just about completely in control of Georgia and are in control of the House of Representatives.

#15 Anonymous on 11/08/10 at 05:32 PM

Other than greed, nothing forced banks to lend money without the proper credit, collateral and adequate down payments

#16 Anonymous on 11/08/10 at 08:40 PM

Greed was the reason First National Bank of Barnesville failed. They were greedy and cared more about lining their own pockets and smoozing with out of towners than they cared about taking care of business. In their effort to have "important" friends, they killed a local institution but do they care? Oh, they have United Bank to come in and clean up their mess while they enjoy life in the mountains and on the lake at the expense of all their shareholders. Shame on them!

#17 Demacrap is all it is on 11/09/10 at 07:29 AM

When will we get to start blaming Obama? Seem's everything on his watch os not his fault. Tell me ONE thing that Obama has done that has given the working man anything to vote for him next term?

#18 Anonymous on 11/09/10 at 09:15 AM

Regardless of who got us in the mess.. it is our new presidents job to get us out! Not dig the hole even deeper!

#19 anon on 11/09/10 at 09:21 AM

One thing Pres. Obama has done for working people is lowering the payroll tax. If you were working like me after last election you noticed more bring home pay in your check.

Of course, now that Rep's have control of Congress they are going to give that tax break to the richest few.

#20 GM on 11/09/10 at 09:52 AM

George W give you the tax break. Obama had nothing to do with it. Obama is trying to take it away. Just like so many Obama supporters, you are misinformed or rely on wishful thinking.

Nobody wants to see any president fail. However, you need to base your material on facts rather than hope.

Interpretation of your comment gives me the impression that you are OK with the philosophy of share the wealth. Please convince me. What gives anyone the right to take what someone else put forth the effort to earn while the other did nothing to earn it?

Do you fully understand capitalism?

#21 Anonymous on 11/09/10 at 10:36 AM

yes I noticed that wopping seven dollar increase in my paycheck followed up by a $35 dollar increase in insurance weekly deduction.

#22 Sheila Tolley on 11/09/10 at 10:48 AM

oBAMA SUCKS!

#23 Anonymous on 11/09/10 at 11:03 AM

Wrong...research "Making Work Pay." It's you who is misinformed.

#24 Anonymous on 11/09/10 at 04:40 PM

"800 million jobs loss" - interesting number for a country with a population of 350 million

#25 trollnmotor on 11/09/10 at 10:41 PM

Sounds like a good reason for insurance and health care reform to me.

#26 trollnmotor on 11/09/10 at 10:46 PM

GW Bush did give us a tax break, and so did Obama, a payroll tax break. Obama has said he wants to extend the Bush tax cuts for those making $250,000 or less a year. He is now willing to compromise on extending the cuts for everyone. If you could do a little research before spouting off what Sean Hannity convinces you of on your drive home every day, you wouldn't sound so ignorant.

#27 Anonymous on 11/10/10 at 05:16 AM

Now this is the best comment I have heard on the whole story. How true your words are!!!

#28 Anonymous on 11/10/10 at 06:27 AM

Free market

#29 GM on 11/10/10 at 06:55 AM

The American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009 was enacted by the 111th United States Congress in February 2009 which Obama signed. Therefore the idea of it being a tax break is argumentative in my opinion. A letter to Congress signed by about 200 economists in favor of the stimulus, written by the “CENTER for AMERICAN PROGRESS ACTION FUND ” said that Obama's plan "proposes important investments that can start to overcome the nation's damaging loss of jobs," and would "put the United States back onto a sustainable long-term-growth path. One of the major individual donors includes George Soros.

George Soros was born a Hungarian Jew but the family changed its name from Schwartz to Soros in 1936, in response to growing anti-Semitism with the rise of Fascism. In Hungarian, soros means next in line, or designated successor. A George Soros notable quote, “The main obstacle to a stable and just world order is the United States”.

The act has accomplished an increase in the deficient, unemployment, lack of business growth, and will ultimately result in one of the highest tax increases the United States has ever seen. It appears obvious to me that the Soros agenda of United States destruction to usher in the new world order is in play.

#30 anon on 11/10/10 at 07:56 AM

I understand capitalism, but I also read history. We are not now, and have not been in a LONG time a fully captilist country. And if you look at history you would understand that unbridled capitalism does not work, as was clearly proven in our country. Have you ever heard of the Robber Barons, have you even been to Jekyll Island, Cumberland Island and seen the mansions. These people became inordinately rich by not only having no income tax but by entering into price fixing agreements and creating monopolies so they could basically rip off the public. Our goverment of the 1900s, a far more conservative government than we have now with either party in power, saw the need to restrict this corporate freedom since the corporation took advantage.

Do you know that during Eisenhowers administration back in the 50s the max tax rate was over 90%? Do you realize Eisenhower was a Republican? Probably not. Of course the rich did not pay this with all the tax loopholes that they still take advantage of today.

Of course, you can continue to support lowering taxes for the top percentile of the country's wealthy at the expense of most everyone else. Maybe you are one of those extremely wealthy individuals so that would make sense. Otherwise you are just another mindless idiot.

#31 Butthead on 11/11/10 at 05:11 PM

Ummm, Shut up Beavis.

#32 anon on 11/13/10 at 05:20 PM

The current head of our county commissioners spent some time there and loaned big money to his buddy on unsecured auto loans. They got rid of him. And now homeowners are suffering because of him. I cant wait till election time rolls around.7pq

#33 Anonymous on 11/13/10 at 07:42 PM

idont think u understand it. it maye be true that we have social issues tied in with government but the people pay all their life for these things. government took it upon themself to spend it and back it up with an iou. its come back to bite em in the butt.

lets see now. the idiots runnig the usa want to move toward socialism but those that already did it are turning to capatalism. some american idiots are just to dumb to speak.

#34 Anonymous on 11/15/10 at 08:43 AM

I found First National Bank friendly and easy to work with, and I was a total stranger to them. The real problem is in deregulation. We can thank republican Phil Gramm and Democrat Bill Clinton for the banking problems.

http://www.politico.com/news/stories/0308/9246.html

Just search the name Phil Gramm and read.

Businesses will always work to the limits of the law and market to maximize profits. The market to lend money is always there, while rules and regulations set the standards of who gets the money.

The real question is why all the tea-baggers, Democrats, and Republicans don't want to change the laws that allowed this to happen.

#35 Algolar on 11/17/10 at 10:30 AM

We voted for CHANGE... boy, we got it!

Only registered users may comment on stories. Please login or register to post comments. Your browser must support cookies.

The author does not allow comments to this entry