Banks Fee Income Rose By $1 Billion In 2003

Banks under $1 billion in assets accounted for only 4%, or $402 million in investment fee income in 2003.

Banks under $100 million in assets produced around $18 million, or just 0.2% of the industry's total.

The top 5 banks nationally in investment fee income last year were J.P. Morgan Chase Bank (N.Y.), Bank of America, N.A. (N.C.), Deutsche Bank Trust Company Americas (N.Y.), Wachovia Bank, N.A. (N.C.), and PNC Bank, N.A. (Pa.).

Banks over $10 billion in assets had the highest mean and median investment fee income and ranked first in every mean and median measurement of investment fee income. Their mean ratio of investment fee income to non-interest income was 9.1% and their median ratio was 4.0%.

Banks in the eastern United States dominated bank investment fee income in 2003, MWA found.

With the highest participation rate in investment fee activities (38.6%), the Northeast region maintained its first place among 6 regions with $4.5 billion of bank investment fee income in 2003. The Southeast region was second with $2.5 billion, and the Mid-Atlantic region was third with $1.3 billion.

MWA compiled the data from reports filed for 2003 with the Federal Reserve Bank and the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation by all 8,254 commercial banks and federally insured savings banks.

Reproduced from National Underwriter Edition, May 28, 2004. Copyright 2004 by The National Underwriter Company in the serial publication. All rights reserved.Copyright in this article as an independent work may be held by the author.