CREATING THE BANC INVESTMENT DAILY

We get asked all the time who writes this publication (it is written by Chris and Steve, with support and research provided by a team of dedicated employees) and how long it has been around. We are often asked where the material comes from, how we keep it fresh, how many readers we have, how long it takes to write each day and who reads it. Many wonder how many employees we have doing research all day, while others want to know where and how we were able to plant listening devices in their bank (as well as those of the banking regulators). While the answers are pretty straightforward, let us first start by saying we write this each and every working day for 15 years running because we are passionate about community banking. We love to research trends, understand the issues and try to find solutions to the industry's biggest problems. We don't tire easily and we are voracious readers of everything financial, fun and banking. In short, we eat, drink, breathe and consume everything we can put our hands on related to community banking. One of the primary reasons it may seem at times like we have bugged your office is because we listen very closely to what our banking customers say. Your problems are our problems and as longtime readers know, we aren't shy about trying to find solutions or calling a spade a spade when we think it will help. Sometimes we are irreverent, sometimes witty and sometimes we fall flat, but each day we begin by thinking about what topic would interest community bank executives and what problems we might be able to solve. As for answers to the questions above - we keep things fresh because we listen and we try to always have fun. We feel that if this publication isn't fun for us to read, it certainly won't be fun for you. We also continually work to refine the process to make sure the end result is as god as we can make it. We also listen very closely to bankers on the phones and as we travel around. Community bankers have great ideas and are not afraid of telling us their problems. That matches up well, since we are more curious than George the monkey. We ask lots of questions and read every financial and regulatory publication we can get our hands on. In addition, we try to have as many discussions with regulators as they will allow in an effort to find out what they see and where they think problems may surface. As for when we write this publication, note that it begins each day around 4:30am our time. While we may research a topic for days, weeks or even months, we never pre-write this section. Call us crazy, but we believe forcing ourselves to write something topical each morning keeps us sharp and helps get the day rolling. Production of the BID takes about 5 person-hours each day and about 15-minutes before we release it for public consumption, everyone on the desk editorializes, heckles and ridicules as we work to clean up comments, prose and dangling participles. Sometimes we get it right and sometimes we miss things, but we always try to deliver timely and interesting information in an easy to read format. At last count, around 40,000 bankers and regulators read the BID. That number is admittedly a bit rough, since intranets and forwarding are common, but we believe it to be pretty close. We have provided this information to you because many have asked, but also because we wanted to also ask you to take a moment and share the BID with a fellow community banker. While some may say our daily readership is decent, our goals and aspirations are even greater. We therefore ask readers to please forward this registration link to another community banker they know so they can register (see link below). In the meantime, we'll keep scribbling down our thoughts and working to keep the BID topical and informative. In closing, thank you for your readership, thoughts, suggestions and comments – please keep them coming.