The Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation reported that FDIC-insured commercial banks and saving institutions’ aggregate net income was $39.8 billion for Q1 2015, a 6.9 percent or $2.6 billion increase from the previous year. The $4.3 billion rise in net operating revenue is mainly responsible for the earnings increase. The FDIC listed their financial results for the first quarter in their latest Quarterly Banking Profile.
Of the 6,419 FDIC-insured institutions, 62.7 percent reported year-over-year growth in quarterly earnings for Q1 2015. Banks that experienced no profit during Q1 dropped to 5.6 percent from 7.4 percent a year earlier. According to the report, stronger loan growth helped raise revenue at most banks, increasing net operating revenue by 2.6 percent to $168.4 billion compared to last year. Meanwhile, net interest income rose $1.5 billion.
Interest rates on conventional purchase-money mortgages decreased from March to April, according to several Federal Housing and Finance Agency indices of new mortgage contracts. The survey found that the national average contract mortgage rate for the purchase of previously occupied homes by combined lenders was 3.78 percent for loans closed in late April, down 2 basis points from March. For conventional, 30-year fixed-rate mortgages of $417,000 or less, the average interest rate was 3.93 percent, a decrease of 2 basis points from March.