Burning Bank Questions

Drew Thomas  0:04  
Fast Fact, more than 30 states permit people to gamble online. Yet, 1/3 of young people don't know the difference between a debit and credit card. I'm Drew Thomas and you're listening to Bank Chats.

Drew Thomas  0:41  
We're going to do something a little bit different, I think. This is a full-length episode of Bank Chats. Yes, that typically has a guest, and we talk about some particular topic or whatever when it comes to banking. And while that is fine, and we're gonna keep doing that, I think that, you know, this is December, it's a little lighter for everybody, and you know, we've been doing Bank Chats now for how long? it's been, oh, over a over a year, yeah. And we have some really good content out there, but we also have a lot of newer listeners that, that didn't get on the train right at the beginning. Yeah. And so, we thought that this actually might be a good opportunity to revisit some, some of our previous topics, but by doing it in a way that we've seen done online, a recap, yeah, but by basically stealing other people's ideas and using them as our own.

Jeff Matevish  1:27  
And that means you're stuck with me as, as, as your guests for the day.

Drew Thomas  1:30  
That's okay. I'm all right with that. For those people that only usually listen to the 2 Cents now you're gonna get, you know, a full-length episode of Jeff and myself talking about this stuff. And I you've seen those videos online. They usually do with celebrities, where they'll ask the most popular Google questions about...

Jeff Matevish  1:49  
And they strip off the tape over, you know, hiding the, the question, yeah, yeah, yeah.

Drew Thomas  1:49  
So, they'll ask still, you know, Sly Stallone, like, you know, you know what is, and then they'll take off the thing, and it'll say, you know, your favorite movie that you've ever done, or something, then he'll talk about it, yeah, you know. Oh, yeah. And he'll say Rambo. I can't, I can't do that very well. Yeah, it's everybody makes fun of Sly Stallone, but honestly, the man had a speech impediment when he was a kid and learned how to do, I mean, anyway, I digress. So, let's go through some of these things. So, we went through, and we did the who, what, when, where, why and how of questions that are asked, most popular questions that are asked of Google. So, who do banks? What do banks? When do banks? That sort of thing, and then the three most popular questions for each of those categories. Yeah, right. Yeah. So, so what do we got first? I guess we started with who, right. So, who do banks answer to?

Jeff Matevish  2:40  
Ooh banks answer to the FDIC for one.

Drew Thomas  2:43  
Yeah, if you're FDIC, insured, if you are, which most banks are right, right.

Jeff Matevish  2:47  
And we actually covered that on episode six of 2 Cents, nudge, nudge, wink, wink, wink. Maybe we'll throw a little clip down there.

Drew Thomas  2:58  
So, the FDIC was created in 1933, and it was, it was basically done after the rise in bank failures that were happening during the early part of the 30s, the Great Depression going on right? 1929 the stock market crashed, and there were a lot of people that were taking their money out of their banks, and the banks were failing because they didn't have enough money to cover their losses or cover the, cover the deposits they were holding, and it really led to this rise of a lot of people sort of not being comfortable with the security of their money in banks, right? So, the federal government actually made every bank close. And then there were new rules and regulations put in place in terms of the governance of deposits that were held at the banks and the banks had to agree to those new rules and regulations before they were permitted to reopen, right.

Jeff Matevish  3:47  
By the way, all of these episodes that we reference will be in the description. We'll have a direct link to them so that that's easy to find. Very cool, yeah, but banks also answer to the Office of the Comptroller of the Currency or the OCC, okay, they, they issue all the regulations and rules that banks have to follow.

Drew Thomas  4:03  
Gotcha. So, yeah. So, I mean, that makes sense and, and to some extent the Federal Reserve system too, yeah, you know, because that's but, so, yeah, I mean, you have to have a license or a charter to be a bank. You can't just stand out on the street corner and call yourself a bank. I mean, there's, there's a lot more to it than that. Oh, yeah. And, you know, there's, there's some real discussion happening right now, and this might make a good episode for next year, whenever we start getting into 2025 talking about FinTechs and what a FinTech is, yeah, because there's a lot of question about whether or not some of these financial technical companies, these hybrids, yeah, are really allowed to do some of the things they're doing, because they're doing a lot of the same things that banks are doing, but they're doing it with less regulation. Oh, yeah. And so, there's, there's some real question happening now with some of these FinTech companies as to what they really should or shouldn't be doing in the world of banking. So, that that might be, you know, a little teaser for, put it in our back pocket. Okay, yeah, we might talk about that next year, but, but yeah, so, so that's, that's who banks answer to. That's the short answer anyway.

Jeff Matevish  5:05  
Yeah, yeah. Okay, who do banks borrow money from?

Drew Thomas  5:09  
Oh, yeah. So, believe it or not, banks do borrow money from time to time. So, generally speaking, a bank will, and we'll get to this, I guess, maybe a little bit later, but you know, banks make money on the interest that they charge on loans, primarily, right? But the banks are also required to have a certain amount of reserve requirement. So, in the 1930s banks were not required to hold a specified amount of cash and reserve relative to their deposit liabilities. And then, following the stock market crash of 1929 there was a run on banks, and they had to shut banks down. And it was a whole big thing, and we still have the original signed charter of, from 1933 when, when, when our bank reopened under the Federal Reserve System that said that we were, you know, a solid, liquid, you know, stable bank.

Jeff Matevish  6:02  
Yeah, oh, I'd like to see that, yeah.

Drew Thomas  6:03  
I'll show it to you. It's in my drawer right over there. So, so, yeah, so, so sometimes banks will borrow money from the Federal Reserve Bank in order to make sure that their ratios are right. There's, we have to have a certain amount on deposit for how many loans we have, and vice versa. So, sometimes the bank will borrow money, usually overnight, to cover just to make sure everything's legal and that we have enough on, on, on deposit to meet our requirements.

Jeff Matevish  6:28  
Bigger banks need, are required to have something like 30 days of [money] to cover payments. Yeah, you know on hand.

Drew Thomas  6:36  
You mean payments for the bank, like their, their light bill and things like that, or?

Jeff Matevish  6:39  
No, no, their, their loans.

Drew Thomas  6:41  
Right. Okay, yeah, yeah, so, so, yeah, so, I mean, there's that, and then, you know, they can borrow from, from other banks, I guess, too. I mean, that could, it gets to be a really complicated question. I think Jeff Stopko actually talks about this a little bit in his one episode.

Jeff Stopko  6:59  
Theoretically, you could lend 100% of our deposits out. Okay, you know, take for every $100 we take in $100 we lend out. It gets more difficult to do that, the closer you get to 100%. But we very much want to lend those deposits back into the economy, because that helps a local economy. When people are borrowing money, when businesses are borrowing money, that means they're spending, and spending is an important tool in our economy. So yeah, it gets, gets more difficult when you get was will fall 100% loan-to-deposit ratio. But as a community bank, AmeriServ, we typically have been running with a loan-to-deposit ratio of 85% to 90% so that means out of every $100 we take in in deposits, we're lending $90 back out. Yeah, it's a good ratio. That means we're supporting our economies. We're helping people buy their home. We're helping a business expand, which is important to the economic viability of the area you live in.

Jeff Matevish  8:05  
That is episode 12, Interest Rates 101, yeah, yeah.

Drew Thomas  8:08  
So, I think, I mean, we talked primarily about interest rates with Jeff, but I think he, and Jeff Stopko, not Jeff, hi, Jeff. Yeah. No different Jeff. But I think he does touch a little bit on, on this question in that episode so you can go back and listen to that there too. So, okay, what do we got next?

Jeff Matevish  8:24  
Who do banks sell mortgages to?

Drew Thomas  8:26  
Who do banks sell mortgages to? Who do banks sell mortgages to?

Jeff Matevish  8:29  
Um, you know, they can sell to investors, so either government owned or government sponsored entities, smaller, non-profit, uh, investors like Fannie Mae, Freddie Mac, Genie Mac.

Drew Thomas  8:39  
The question is, why do banks sell mortgages? I guess that's the bigger question. Like, because I think when people are Googling, like, we're going off of Google, right? So, I think what's happening is people are asking, like, well, why is my mortgage being sold to somebody else?

Jeff Matevish  8:52  
Right, to free up some capital and give them the ability to give out new loans. Yeah, yeah. And honestly, there's a thriving secondary market for lending like this. Dave O'Leary touches on this in his mortgage episode too.

Dave O'Leary  9:05  
A lot of the loans that are originated wind up being sold on the secondary market to other investors like Penny Mac or Truist or Wells Fargo, until recently, was in that, that game too, that, that secondary market thing as it because of that, the fact that these are bundled up and sold to sometimes multiple investors, and then eventually, sometimes can wind up, and you may have heard this term get thrown around a lot in 2008, mortgage backed securities. Everyone involved in that process needs a certain level of comfort that the loans were processed and documented and handled in the same way. Because these all sort of wind up, not all, but a number of them wind up as various forms of collateral down the road, and the investors all have to have a belief that the loans are credit worthy. There's going to be repayment without too much issue things like that.

Drew Thomas  10:19  
Lenders sell mortgages so they have money to lend other borrowers, like Jeff just said. But sometimes it's really, it's not uncommon, let's, let's put it that way, for a bank to sell off a mortgage. So, if your, if your mortgage is being sold to another, to another financial institution, don't panic. It's nothing you did wrong. Your rates not going to change, your terms, not going to change, like nothing for you changes other than where you make your payment.

Jeff Matevish  10:44  
So, the customer does know that their, their loan has been sold. So, it's not like you know behind the scenes, you know your loan is now handled by a different company, but you're still paying that, that same bank or wherever you have your, your mortgage with?

Drew Thomas  10:56  
Correct, correct. So, you don't really have a choice in the matter if a bank decides to sell your loan, like they own the loans, and they can sell it if they want to, but they can't make life harder for you in the process. So, they can't, you know, agree to an interest rate with you and then sell it to someone else, and then your interest rate changes. Okay, it's not fair. Okay, so if your loan gets sold, it's fine. That's pretty typical, but just understand that instead of you making your loan payment to whatever bank you went through to get the loan in, to get your mortgage in the first place. Now you're going to make your payment to that new company, okay, or that new financial institution. So, here's the thing, especially within the first few months after you, you buy a new property, make sure you're opening your mail like, like, don't just assume it's junk mail, because you never know if you're giving a piece of mail from your new lender, and you didn't realize that that new lender was, that happened to me! Oh, really, when I, when I bought my house, I went through one bank and they, they sold the loan off to another company, and I got the piece of mail and I that's how I found out they sold the loan was I got the piece of mail from the new company to say, hey, congratulations on being a customer of us. Okay, so make sure you're opening your mail.

Jeff Matevish  12:06  
And you're most likely not going to get, like, a text or an email, so yeah, probably not. Don't, don't, you know, open that email or text and says, hey, we sold your loan, click here. Don't click that link.

Drew Thomas  12:16  
Yeah, yeah. Just wait, you'll get something on paper, trust me. When you're buying a house, you sign a lot of paper, yeah, so and then when you get that notice in the mail, make sure you're checking to see where the payment is going to go, okay, so that you're paying the right place. If you set up automatic payments, make sure you are contacting the new servicer to make sure that they're still receiving the payments. That servicer also may be handling your escrow. So, if you're in a situation where you're paying one payment that you consider your quote, unquote mortgage payment, but that mortgage payment also includes your taxes for your municipality and your home insurance, all in one thing, make sure your servicer has all that correct information. So, you just want to make sure you're reading through everything when you get it, to make sure they have everything right. Gotcha, because ultimately, still your responsibility, yeah, yeah. So, yeah, so, so, if you get something like that, don't panic, but be aware of it and make sure that you check everything make sure it's right, yeah, sure. Okay, so those were the top three "Who's" on Google. Who do banks answer to? Who do banks borrow money from? And who do banks sell mortgages to?

Jeff Matevish  13:21  
Sound like a banker owl, yeah.

Drew Thomas  13:23  
Who, who, who, who. It's that time of year, I sound like Dr. Seuss, yeah. All right. So, what do we got next, right?

Jeff Matevish  13:29  
Yeah, we got the whats, so what do banks do with your money?

Drew Thomas  13:32  
What do banks do with your money? They roll around in it, dive in it like Scrooge McDuck. That's what they do.

Jeff Matevish  13:38  
Yes, yes, yes. No, they can lend it to other customers, which is a big part of you know what to do with your money. Yeah, invest in assets like bonds and stocks and real estate, or they can add it, just add it to their cash reserve, so that other banks can borrow it at an interest, you know, and they're making money on that too.

Drew Thomas  13:56  
Yeah, yeah. So, I mean, let's, let's be honest, I mean, you know, we're going to talk, we have a, we have a 2 Cents coming up I think that we're going to talk a little bit about the differences between banks and credit unions and stuff like that. But, you know, banks are for profit, and that doesn't make banks bad. I mean, there's every in a capitalist society that we live in, in the United States, every business is for profit for the most part. I mean, when you buy something at your grocery store, they're for profit. They're not selling you, you know, your vegetables at cost. You know they're marking them up a little bit. And you know, they got to keep the lights on. They got to pay their employees. They got to, know, have insurance on the building. They got to plow the parking lot. If you live in an area where, where you have snow, which we do, so...

Jeff Matevish  14:40  
And banks make profits so that we can give, you know, the customers a better experience, or, you know, better features, or something like that too.

Drew Thomas  14:46  
Right, yeah. So, what do banks do with your money? Well, they mostly lend it out to people who need it, is really what they're doing with your money. But by doing that, they're also earning the money that they need to maintain everything and keep your money safe and secure and stuff like that.

Jeff Matevish  15:01  
Right, right. What's next? What do banks look for when applying for a loan? We talked about this on Episode 11 of Bank Chats and also Residential Mortgages, Part I and II. That's episodes one and two going back really far.

Drew Thomas  15:15  
Yeah, back to the very beginning. I bet you know what? I don't know. I they hold up? Do the first episodes hold up. I don't know if they do. It's like, watching season one of your favorite TV show. After you've watched seven seasons, you're like, oh, this is so cringe.

Jeff Matevish  15:28  
Those are the pilots. Yeah.

Drew Thomas  15:29  
So, what was the question?

Jeff Matevish  15:31  
So, what do banks look for when a, when applying for a loan?

Drew Thomas  15:35  
Oh yeah, well I mean, I think that, I think most people would know. I mean, they're gonna look at your basic stuff like they're gonna look at your personal your personal information, first of all, make sure that you are who you say you are. So, they're going to need some sort of identification. They're going to need to make sure your name and address and phone number and all that contact information is correct. Your social security number is who you say you are. It depends on the loan. Sometimes they'll ask you what the loan's for, but that's typically if you're getting a specific type of loan, like a car loan, vehicle loan, yeah, but if you're getting a home equity loan or something like that, they don't usually ask what it's for.

Jeff Matevish  16:10  
Or they may ask, but they don't really, I mean, just to put it on a piece of paper, what it's for, but, yeah, it's not gonna, it's not going to change whether you're going to get that loan or not, you know.

Drew Thomas  16:17  
Right, yeah, I mean, if you say, hey, I'm taking the vacation with this, the bank doesn't really care if it's something like home equity loans, as long as, as long as it's, you know, handled by your home's value. You're, you're, you're good. You can use it whatever for whatever you want. Yeah, what else are they going to look for? I mean, they're going to look at your loan, the amount of the loan that you're asking for, whether or not they feel like you can repay it within the payment term.

Jeff Matevish  16:17  
So, they're going to look at your credit score and your, your employment status, your income, yeah, so to make sure that you aren't, you know, are credit worthy.

Drew Thomas  16:35  
Yeah, that you don't have any, you're not currently dealing with a bankruptcy. You're not delinquent on your payments for other creditors, because if they pull your credit report and they see that you're behind on your three credit card payments, they're most likely not going to want to want to give you another loan, because you're probably going to be delinquent on that too if you can't pay your existing debts, why, what makes the bank think you could pay this one? Sure, and this is something that I think when we talk with Rusty in our Consumer Lending episode, so episode three, episode three, that it was really episode three?

Jeff Matevish  17:19  
That was episode three. It was, yeah, Residential Mortgages, Residential Mortgages Part II, and Commercial Lending were the first three. Wow.

Drew Thomas  17:26  
We talk a little bit about how, if you're getting something like a consolidation loan. So, can we talk a bit about consolidation loans? Right, you, you hear about that all the time, like you can lower your debt, and you can try to get out of debt with a consolidation loan. And it seems counterintuitive, I think, sometimes to people that, why would I take on more debt to get out of debt?

Russell Flynn  17:51  
You take on more debt to get out of debt, because you can consolidate into a much lower interest rate. I typically like tell people, if you're going to consolidate debt, do it into a term loan where you're going to have a fixed interest rate to pay it off. Because if you just put it into a credit line to extend it and maybe pay interest only, you're not doing yourself any kind of favor, because all you're doing is extended the time in the interest savings that you potentially get. So, you don't want to trade debt for debt where it's not being paid down over a period of time. People can go through and consolidate debt, if they do responsibly, they're going to have a term loan, pay it off, hopefully they use a credit line you know to more responsibly for short-term borrowing needs versus long term.

Drew Thomas  18:36  
Right. Make sure you're telling your bank that, because when they go to look at your credit history and your credit score, and they see a bunch of outstanding loans and debts out there, and you just say, well I want another loan. And you don't tell them why, sometimes that can make a difference in whether or not you get approved, because they may be looking at your debt-to-income ratio and saying you can't afford another loan. Yeah, but if you tell them, hey, listen, I'm using this to consolidate lending. I want to close those other accounts, or I want to pay off those other accounts by using this loan, well, that's a different story.

Jeff Matevish  19:11  
Yeah, and make it look like you're trying to do better, yeah, yeah.

Drew Thomas  19:14  
well, not only that, but you're not going to have those payments. You're going to have one, right.

Jeff Matevish  19:19  
One loan now instead of six.

Drew Thomas  19:21  
Yeah, so they don't really have to consider those payments, because those payments will all zero out when you get this new loan that pays those off. Yeah, right. So, keep that in mind too. Don't, don't just assume that the bank is out, like so many people, assume the bank is like out to get you, like the bank is there to help you. Yeah. Okay,

Jeff Matevish  19:37  
So, you covered the debt-to-income ratio. So, what do banks do with repossessed cars? This is a good one.

Drew Thomas  19:43  
Yeah, what do banks do with repossessed cars? So, again, I want to stress this. The bank is not out to get you right, right?

Jeff Matevish  19:50  
We don't. We don't want your car.

Drew Thomas  19:51  
We don't want your car. We would much rather you make your payments on time and keep your car. Yes, the whole, that's the whole point. So, not only that, but, if the bank has to repossess a car, which, which unfortunately does happen from time to time, it is probably not even the second or third best option for the bank, but eventually it may get to that point, yeah, repossess your repossess a car. Typically, when a bank repossesses a car, they'll, they'll employ a third-party auction like an auto auction company, and they'll pay them a commission to sell the car at auction. Yeah?

Jeff Matevish  20:23  
And that's usually a private auction that's not open to the public. You know, you have to have a dealer status.

Drew Thomas  20:29  
 Yeah, and typically the prices on those are way below, like, steep discount. Oh, yeah, you end up buying a car at one of those auctions. So, the bank is typically not even getting, they're probably still taking a loss. They're just not taking as big of a loss, sure, as if they didn't sell the car or repossess the car in the first place. So, even when you think the bank has won by repossessing your car, chances are the bank is still losing money.

Jeff Matevish  20:54  
Yeah, but I mean, they can sell, you know, outright to someone if they, they want the car too. That doesn't happen as often. I wouldn't imagine.

Drew Thomas  21:03  
I wouldn't, I would imagine that probably happens a lot more with smaller community banks. Sure, where they have like, one branch in a small town and they sit the car in the parking lot and put a for sale sign on it. Yeah, we do live in a relatively small town, and years ago, I do remember a local bank doing that. They had like, a couple cars in their lot.

Jeff Matevish  21:22  
My dad was telling me that same thing.

Drew Thomas  21:23  
That's typically what happens. That's, okay, yeah, cool.

Jeff Matevish  21:26  
When do banks make money? I mean, we kind of did that one already. Yeah, we can talk about fees that that banks get from certain accounts. That's true, like checking accounts, opening certain checking accounts, you have to, you know, pay up an annual fee, or if you have a trust department that charges fees, interchange fees on debit card ATMs. Yeah. No, it's not a lot, but that's still a profit for the bank.

Drew Thomas  21:51  
Yeah, surcharge fees. Yeah, typically surcharge fees would be on if you're using an if you're not a customer of the bank, yeah, and you're using a non, if you're using an ATM that is not your bank's ATM, you're probably going to pay a surcharge fee. They're getting higher. I mean, it used to be, you know, $1 or $2. Now a lot of banks are sort of being forced to, to raise those surcharge fees, mostly because ATMs aren't being used as often. So, and it costs a lot of money to maintain that ATM network. So, yeah, so a lot of times, that's what it is, and you can sometimes avoid those by going to some banks will do surcharge free. Some Yeah, you know, yeah. But it's funny, it's just like anything else. If you're in a sports stadium or a casino or something, you're gonna pay much higher surcharge fees.

Jeff Matevish  22:35  
Oh yes, yeah.

Drew Thomas  22:36  
For that money than you would if you just went down to your local convenience store or something like that. But so, yeah, there are fees. That's true. You know.

Jeff Matevish  22:43  
Any other fees that banks normally would make?

Drew Thomas  22:46  
Yeah, no, I don't think so. I mean, I mean, primarily, the biggest income for banks is the interest income that they generate on loans and stuff like that. But you're right, there are, there are other things like that that do generate income for the bank, for sure, so.

Jeff Matevish  22:58  
Okay, when do banks close on Saturday? That's a trick question.

Drew Thomas  23:03  
A little subjective, yeah, but it's there, so we'll ask it, yeah. I'd imagine a lot of people are asking, when do banks close on Saturday, because they're I mean, if it's a Google search, they're probably just trying to find out when their personal bank closes.

Jeff Matevish  23:15  
Yeah, they left out their actual bank name, yeah, yeah.

Drew Thomas  23:19  
So, I guess that depends. You got to ask your bank. I mean, some, some banks are, are not open on Saturdays. Most banks have at least a few branches that are open, usually till like noon.

Jeff Matevish  23:29  
Or they have drive through hours or something like that. They may not have lobby hours.

Drew Thomas  23:32  
Yeah, if you're, if you're one of those banks that's in, like, a grocery store or Walmart or something, maybe you're open a little later, yeah, a little longer, because you're right there and there's a lot of foot traffic. But we could take this opportunity to talk a little bit about holidays. Bank holidays. Bank holidays, okay. Because if you work for a bank, you get 11 free days a year of vacation. Perk, yeah, a little bit of a side perk working for a bank. Some of those are holidays that a lot of people are off anyway as well, like Thanksgiving or Christmas, right.

Jeff Matevish  24:05  
And those, and those are closed because the Federal Reserve is closed as well.

Drew and Jeff  24:09  
Correct. Okay, yeah. And you're also not gonna, I mean, even not, not that it has anything to do with your bank deposits, but even things like the stock market are closed, oh yeah, like, basically Wall Street's shut down. I mean, there's nothing like that happening. The post office is closed. So, a lot of anything federal is going to be closed on federal holidays. Other holidays though, well, let's just so, New Year's Day. Almost everybody's off New Year's Day, but Martin Luther King Jr Day. So, banks are closed. Presidents Day in February, banks are closed. And then you kind of skip ahead to Memorial Day. So, Memorial Day, you're close. We're closed on Memorial Day, Fourth of July, Juneteenth, Juneteenth now, yeah, Juneteenth now, in June. And then Fourth of July, Labor Day, Columbus Day, or Indigenous People's Day, depending on your preference, yep. Veterans Day, and then, Thanksgiving and Christmas, right? So, that's 11. I always want to put New Year's Day at the end, but it's actually the first. And yeah, it's actually the first. We see it at the end of the calendar. But yeah, yeah. So, so there's those. So, if it makes anybody feel better, for, for those of you that have to work on, say, for example, President's Day, when the banks in the post office are off and you're all still working the day after President's Day is kind of a nightmare for us, because we're making up for everybody being at work the day before and we weren't, yeah? So, we're doing double work that day with all the extra deposits and things like that. So, if it makes you feel any better, even though we're closed, we're working twice as hard day after. Fair enough. Yeah. What do we got next?

Jeff Matevish  25:40  
When do banks update accounts?

Drew Thomas  25:43  
When do banks update accounts? How would you, how would you interpret that question? When do banks update accounts?

Jeff Matevish  25:47  
So, if I put a deposit of $100 in a checking account, do I automatically see that $100 deposit on my online banking or?

Drew Thomas  25:58  
Okay, so you that's, that's how I take so you're so, so that's probably right. So, I'm guessing that's probably how they're interpreting that question. Because, like, update accounts could mean, like, well, when do they change their checking accounts? Like, I don't know, every but, but yeah. If you're, you're right. If, if, if people are asking, when will my account reflect the activity that I have performed?

Jeff Matevish  26:16  
That's a good way to put it. Yeah, yep.

Drew Thomas  26:18  
Usually overnight. Okay, usually overnight. There are some banks that are going almost real-time so that, like you make a, you make a purchase, you log into your online banking 10 minutes later, and you see the purchase there. Sometimes it depends, it also depends on the retailer. Yeah, because not every retailer transmits their transactions in real-time, believe it or not. Oh, so you might have, especially smaller stores, smaller businesses, mom and pops, and what they'll do is they'll, they'll sort of do all their transactions for the day, or for the half a day, or something like that, and then they'll transmit all of those is like a bundle of transactions.

Jeff Matevish  26:55  
They're batching them.

Drew Thomas  26:55  
Yeah. Batching them out. Yeah. So, if you make a purchase right after they've run a batch at, say, one o'clock in the afternoon, and they've just run a batch at 12:30 and they don't run their next batch until 6pm or something like that. Then you may not see that transaction, even if you are a real time bank, okay, it may not show up right away.

Jeff Matevish  27:13  
But a good general rule is, you know, every 24 hours or so, okay.

Drew and Jeff  27:17  
Yeah, so and then again, remember your bank holidays, right? So, you're sure, so these are business days, right? So, we've talked about business days before, yes, on one of the episodes on a 2 Cents. Have we ever talked about business days? No, we haven't. No, we haven't. Explained this.

Jeff Matevish  27:37  
My understanding, yeah. So, a bank can deposit money up to a certain time of the day. Anything after that time, whether it's during the business hours, is considered to be on the next business day, correct?

Drew Thomas  27:51  
Yeah, now a lot of banks are now going to same day, okay, right? So, that so, I mean, rules have changed a little bit based on, like, whenever I first got into banking years ago, yeah, but essentially, yes. So, a business day is going to be a day when the bank is normally open for business, right? So, that's going to be a Monday through Friday traditionally, okay. If it's a holiday, like a Memorial Day or a Labor Day that falls on a Monday that is not a business day. Saturdays, even though some branches are open on Saturdays, for most banks that is not considered a business day, right? So, a business day is a Monday through Friday, normal working hours, that sort of thing. So, what people don't always get is that the next business day for a deposit might be if I deposit something, say, through mobile banking, at 10 o'clock at night on a Friday. Well, most banks are already closed for the day, so they're on Monday's business, which means that your deposit may not show up until Tuesday. So, even though you're depositing at 10pm Friday, your money may not show up in your account until Tuesday morning. And yet, that's still considered one business day, right? And then you see when you start adding holidays and things like that into the mix, sometimes it can be four or five days before even though the bank considers it one business day, it might be multiple days. If it goes over a weekend or something like that. It can be calendar days, significantly more than, than business days. But keep that in mind too. So, you know, updating accounts. Could, could, you know, vary depending on weekends and bank holidays, yeah, like that. So, so, where do banks get their money to lend? Is that right? Yeah, where do banks, well, from depositors. Yeah. I mean, we kind of touched on that already, right in when we talked about, you know, who do banks answer to, and where do banks get, you know, do with their money?

Jeff Matevish  29:41  
And we get, we get money from the Federal Reserve or other banks, yeah, um, buying securities.

Drew Thomas  29:47  
Yeah, but, but, I mean, really, I mean all of those are true. But I'd say probably at least 65% of the money that we lend out is from depositors who put their money in the bank to begin with, right? So, regardless of what bank you're with. I'm not saying this to be, you know, selfish, I'm just saying any bank like, you're helping your neighbors in your community by putting your money in the bank. Because, if you don't put your money in the bank as a deposit, the bank can't lend as much money out to people that need it.

Jeff Matevish  30:13  
Yeah, they're gonna be more picky, yeah.

Drew Thomas  30:14  
You know, and especially if it's a community bank like us, like, if you're Chase or Bank of America or something, I, I'm not trying to disparage them, but they're giant, megalithic banks that cover multi-states, multi-countries. But if you're a small community bank, you know, consider banking with your community bank, because your community bank is much more likely to be lending to your local community that needs it.

Jeff Matevish  30:33  
Yeah, well, and think of it this way too. You know, Chase is not picking up garbage off the side of the road, but your local community bank may, on the weekends, help the community in other ways, yeah.

Drew Thomas  30:42  
Yeah, absolutely. So, yep.

Jeff Matevish  30:45  
Where do banks store their money?

Drew Thomas  30:47  
This is an interesting question.

Jeff Matevish  30:49  
It depends on how you look at it, yeah, yeah, physically, or?

Drew Thomas  30:52  
Well, that's so I think that's, that's the difference now, right? Is, you know, we used to have this world where everything was cash and you had Fort Knox that had like 75 gates and all these guards, yeah? And I'm sure it probably still does, but banks are not like that as much anymore. I mean, they're so, so here's the thing, every bank is going to have a vault, right, which is a protected area very difficult to enter without permission, yeah. And you know, so a bank will keep cash on hand for people that need cash, yeah, or want cash, yeah. So, so banks do still have vaults for things like that, but in terms of all the money a bank handles, you know, it's so much of it has gone digital. I don't want to say it's not physically here, but it's, it's, it's not as tangible as it may, it may have been 100 years ago. Yeah, let's put it that way. Yeah. That doesn't mean that if you go into your bank and ask for your money, you won't get it, you will, right? But it might be issued to you in the form of a check, especially if you're dealing with a large amount that sort of you unexpectedly demand from the bank. You know, if you go in and say, well, I want to withdraw all my money and it's, and it's $2 million worth of deposits, they're not likely to have $2 million on cash on hand, first of all. Oh, yeah, right. But on top of that, it's a safety issue. They're not going to hand you $2 million in cash and run the risk that you're going to walk out onto the sidewalk and be robbed. Yeah, right. So, it's much, much safer for you, for the bank to issue a cashier's check made to your name so that you can take that money wherever you want to take it and use it and whatever. So, banks store money electronically, for the most part, they'll store it with the Federal Reserve banks to make interest on that. Sometimes they'll sort of the bank will sort of deposit into another bank and then earn interest, right? Yeah.

Jeff Matevish  32:43  
Google had an interesting take on it, a little bit, yeah, yeah, yeah. Well, okay...

Drew Thomas  32:48  
These are Google questions after all.

Jeff Matevish  32:49  
I'm assuming, an interesting take on it, but they said loans. So, your bank is keeping its securities and loans. So, even though the bank doesn't physically have that money, it's keeping it safe with another person.

Drew Thomas  33:01  
Oh, that's a good point.

Jeff Matevish  33:03  
That's how I took it.

Drew Thomas  33:04  
I like that. Yeah, that's, that's true. You're right. I took that a different way, but that's a good point. You're right. I mean, really, if, if the money's lending, lent out to another person for whatever, then really, your money's safe with them.

Jeff Matevish  33:17  
We're done with the wheres. We're under the whys. Okay. Why do banks pay interest on deposits?

Drew Thomas  33:23  
Yeah, why do, why do banks pay interest on deposit? Well, because, okay, so, I mean, I feel like a little bit of a broken record here, because we kind of keep coming back to this. I think some people are Googling the things, they're asking the same question in different ways, yeah, but banks pay interest on deposits, so to incentivize you to put your money with, with the bank. Yeah, right. The bank needs deposits to be able to turn around and make loans to help the community, but also to make money for the bank. Because that's primarily, you know, the interest on loans is where we make a lot of the money that we, we generate to employ people like yourself and me and keep the lights on and all that stuff. But that's why, I mean, if, if there was no incentive to put money in the bank by earning money for yourself in the process, then you would park it somewhere else, yeah, right.

Jeff Matevish  34:07  
You'd keep it under your mattress, like we said, not to.

Drew Thomas  34:10  
Yeah, don't do that. That's so dangerous too. Yeah, not only from a theft standpoint, but God forbid, your house burns down or something like that. You don't want to lose all your money because you stored it under the mattress. That's terrible.

Jeff Matevish  34:20  
And you know, if your financial institution is FDIC insured, then your money is insured that way too.

Drew Thomas  34:25  
Absolutely. Yeah, yes. Excellent plug, or point. Next.

Jeff Matevish  34:28  
Why do banks put a hold on checks?

Drew Thomas  34:30  
Why don't we ask Serena Williams.

Jeff Matevish  34:32  
Yes, we talked about that on 2 Cents episode 10.

Drew Thomas  34:38  
So, have you ever had a hold put on a check?

Jeff Matevish  34:40  
I don't think I've ever tried to deposit a check large enough that would require a hold, but fair enough I mean, I know what, I have an idea what they are, okay. They're gonna hold the check to make sure that those funds are available.

Drew Thomas  34:52  
Yeah, I mean, like, honestly, before I got into banking, I had no idea that they would ever hold checks. I just assumed that when you took a check to the bank, they just deposited into your account, and you went on your way. Yeah, but there are people that, that you for whatever reason, whether it's um, they get an inheritance or they get an insurance payout, maybe it's that they got a, I don't know, some sort of a windfall, whatever it is. They won the lottery, they got a big bonus at work, for whatever it is, if somebody brings a check into the bank and says, well, I want to deposit this, and it's outside the norm of their normal deposit, you know behavior, chances are the bank's going to say, well, we need to put a deposit hold on this, right? And that can make people irritated sometimes, because it makes you feel sometimes like you're doing something wrong. Yeah, yeah. I can't see that, yeah. And I don't think that that's true. Like, in most cases, people aren't doing anything wrong. They're just legitimately trying to deposit something that they feel is true. But in some cases, you know that check, you know the bank wants to make sure that the funds are actually available, the check doesn't bounce so they can put a hold on it. Now, normally, according to Regulation CC, okay, most banks, what they'll do is they have to provide you with $200 of that deposit the next business day, and then, traditionally, the remaining amount of the deposit, whatever it is, by the second business day.

Jeff Matevish  36:09  
Very good Drew.

Drew Thomas  36:10  
So, that's why you put holds on checks. That is. Why do banks charge an overdraft fee? I mean, I think it goes back to what you said about fees, right? The banks do need to make money. And you know, I know this may not be as popular of a notion as it once was, but ultimately you are responsible for you, right? Yes, so if you're overdrafting your account, that means that you are using money that is not yours.

Jeff Matevish  36:10  
May teach you to be a little more careful.

Drew Thomas  36:25  
I mean, really, that's what it comes down to. I mean, you're, you're buying something with money that you don't have.

Jeff Matevish  36:47  
You're taking out a loan that was not approved.

Drew Thomas  36:49  
Yeah, right, yeah. So, the bank oftentimes and you know you, you can, first of all, let me put it this way, with your bank, you can instruct the bank that you do not wish to opt in to something like overdraft protection, which means that if you hand somebody your debit card and there's not enough money in your account to cover whatever purchase you're making, it will be declined, right? Yep. Now, as a courtesy, if you opt out of that overdraft, you know, sort of protection, protection, or whatever it is, your bank may call it something different, you will be declined and you won't, you will never be charged that fee, because you will never overdraft your account, right? A lot of people don't want to be embarrassed. They don't want to go to a store hand their card over and have it be declined in front of a line of people behind them, and then have to try to figure out, okay, well, now I need to take 75, things back out of a bag at the grocery store because I can't afford to pay for them, and then they have to rerun your tape, and then it, it's a whole thing and, and so people don't want that embarrassment, right? So, some people will choose to allow the bank to let the transaction go through. But if it you know, if that transaction is too far beyond what your account can handle, then your bank will usually charge you a courtesy, a fee for that courtesy, right? Because you're covering you, yeah, you're not using money that you're using money that is not yours to make that purchase at that point. So, that's why, I mean really, it's whether or not you want that sort of courtesy from your bank to avoid embarrassment. And a lot of banks, you know, a lot of banks have different thresholds for that too. So, if you, for example, are say, you know, some banks will say, like, say, $3 like, if you're, if you're less than $3 beyond your, your limit, right...

Jeff Matevish  38:39  
We're not going to charge you?

Drew Thomas  38:41  
Some banks won't charge you as a, okay, you know, you only went like, $2 under, like, you know, whatever. But every bank's different. Some banks charge you a penny, and some banks will maybe go up to, like, say, five bucks or something like that, without charging you. Yeah, but find out from your bank.

Jeff Matevish  38:56  
I'm okay to be embarrassed. I'd rather not have to pay a fee for Yeah, I know, yeah.

Drew Thomas  38:59  
And there was an option, right? But you got to tell your bank that you say, look, hey, listen, I'm good with you not allowing this through, yeah, knowing that I will never then overdraft my account. Yeah.

Jeff Matevish  39:10  
And your bank should ask you that at account opening usually, yeah, yeah.

Drew Thomas  39:13  
And you can make that change, I think, pretty much anytime, assuming, of course, that you're not delinquent on a bunch of other stuff in your bank. Sure. So yeah. But again, these are, these are general rules. They are not, or general guidelines. They are not hard and fast rules for every bank. Yeah. So, yeah. So, what's our next question?

Jeff Matevish  39:28  
Okay, so, why do banks exist? So, the origins, I found this on Google. Oh, go for it. So, the origins of banking can be traced back to ancient Mesopotamia, around 2000 BCE, when temples served as the first known banks. Priests would lend out valuable items and grain from the temple to local farmers and merchants. I thought that was interesting. So, that is very interesting. Our first banks were temples.

Drew Thomas  39:53  
Yeah. Now, now, here's the addendum I can add to that. Okay, again, you're the, you're the history buff. Full of useless knowledge. So, you'll also find, starting around that time in ancient Mesopotamia, you would find that there were people that acted as a sort of a bank in terms of, if you were traveling long distances from one city to another, one city state to another, okay, it could be very dangerous. You would have highwaymen, which are basically robbers along the highway. So, if you packed up all of your stuff and all of your money into your wagon, and you're traveling, you know, hundreds of miles to another city state, which, again, you got to remember, this is ancient Mesopotamia. That could be a weeks long, months long journey. It was dangerous to have all your stuff with you. So, yeah. So, what you would they would also do is they would essentially go to someone who would evaluate what they had and sort of come up with a number, okay, so whatever, everything you have here, is worth X dollars. And they would write a sort of, I don't wanna say a loan, but sort of a script that would say, I Jeff Matevish, swear that Drew Thomas has X number of dollars in value, right? Oh, okay. He would sign it. They would have a partner in other city states where, once you arrived at your destination, you would go to that partner, and you would hand them that piece of paper, okay, or wax tablet, or whatever it was, and they would say, oh, I see that my partner in X city state has vouched that you have this amount of money, then they would give you your money.

Jeff Matevish  41:25  
So, this is for a loan. This is for a loan or? Oh...

Drew Thomas  41:28  
They would, it was basically a way to transact, like to sort of like, not have to carry your money. You would give all of your stuff to that first merchant, okay, you know? And then when you got the other side, they would basically give you that equivalent value in coin or whatever, so that you could go rebuy whatever you needed. Okay, so that was sort of like your first sort of bank process of being able to deposit in one location and withdraw at another. Okay, by doing it that way. Okay, cool. So, yeah, interesting stuff, at least it is to me. It's not to anybody else, but it is to me.

Jeff Matevish  41:58  
No, that's interesting.

Drew Thomas  41:59  
Yeah, all right, I think we're making progress. I think we're down to what the hows, right?

Jeff Matevish  42:04  
We are down to the hows, yeah. All right, how do banks make a profit? We've talked about that, yeah, interest on, on loans, fees.

Drew Thomas  42:12  
I don't think we need to go now through that again. All right, next.

Jeff Matevish  42:14  
How do banks create money? That's a weird, weird question. Yeah.

Drew Thomas  42:20  
I mean, banks don't create money. Right. The US Mint creates money. Right. If you're talking about the tangible form of money, whether it's a printed dollar bill or a coin, right? The, so the US Treasury would stamp coins, and, I mean, they create money.

Jeff Matevish  42:36  
So, Google's answer to that was, banks create money when they lend out excess reserve that depositors give them. So, it's not really creating money. It's, I would call that growing money, value, yeah, creating value, growing money for one bank from another bank.

Drew Thomas  42:49  
Yeah, something like, I mean, I guess, yeah, yeah.

Jeff Matevish  42:52  
That was worded a little odd.

Drew Thomas  42:54  
Whichever way you took that question, you can either choose my answer or Jeff's answer, and you have your answer.

Jeff Matevish  42:59  
Perfect, yeah. How do banks investigate unauthorized transactions?

Drew Thomas  43:04  
Ah, that's interesting. So, this might be a good time to tell people to reference some of our cyber security episodes. Check out the guys from Saint Francis. You got Kevin Slonka and Mike Zambotti. Mike Zambotti, you know they, we have a lot of good stuff about, about fraud and things like that, because investigating unauthorized transactions, and the most recent one that we did with them in October of this year, just two months ago. So, Episode 16, focuses a lot on, if you want to get into that industry as a career, because it's becoming a big deal.

Michael Zambotti  43:43  
It's so important and for anybody looking to get into the field, note this fact, in order to protect something, you have to understand how it works. So, you have to understand how computer networks work, how organizations use technology, how your attack surface can expand whenever you add new technologies that might increase functionality or people, it's really that core understanding of networks, computer networks, how they work, and getting that knowledge first.

Drew Thomas  44:06  
I think that's an important distinction. I've used this example with other people, and I apologize if I've used it with you guys too. But I attended a conference a number of years ago, and there was a keynote speaker who is the director of a generational sort of studies organization, they look at how different generations respond to different things, right? And try to interpret how to market to them and what their interests are, and so forth. And he asked the audience, he said, okay, I want you to finish this sentence. He goes, young people are computer and most people said, savvy, right? It's a computer savvy. And he's like, actually, that's not true anymore, because young people are not computer savvy. Middle aged people are computer savvy. Young people are computer dependent, or technology dependent. They don't understand how it works. They just know that it does work.

Kevin Slonka  44:56  
That is very true.

Drew Thomas  44:59  
We talked a little bit about, where do banks keep their money. And I said, you know, there's not like, it's not like it was 100 years ago, but there's this giant bank vault that, you know, people would, would, you know, you watch the old, the old westerns, where they bank robbers would, would break into the vault and steal all this money like it has become sort of a cyber, a cyber version of that. You know, cyber criminals are out there trying to steal your money, either directly from you, by asking you for your personal information, your passwords and so forth, and then hacking your accounts. And if that happens, then the banks are usually trying to find out whether that transaction was legitimate or not.

Jeff Matevish  45:35  
Yeah. Or they're trying to prevent that transaction from going through to begin with, yeah.

Drew Thomas  45:39  
Right, yeah.

Jeff Matevish  45:40  
So, I guess there's two ways to look at this. So, Google went the cyber route, okay, but I think of the, the physical route. So, that's another reason why we put, say, holds on checks. So, you have a, you know, a bad check, we're gonna put a hold on it till we make sure that that check is going to clear, you know, yeah.

Drew Thomas  45:59  
What's that called?

Jeff Matevish  46:00  
A check hold?

Drew Thomas  46:01  
Yeah, but what's the fraud called? check kiting!

Jeff Matevish  46:05  
Check kiting?

Drew Thomas  46:06  
Check kiting. You don't know check kiting?

Jeff Matevish  46:07  
No, I don't know check kiting.

Drew Thomas  46:09  
So, if you've ever watched, Catch Me If You Can with Leonardo DiCaprio and Tom Hanks, it's about a guy named Frank Abagnale Jr. Okay, and Frank Abagnale Jr actually ended up working eventually for the FBI as a consultant, and was responsible for a lot of the things that you now see on checks to prevent fraud. Oh, okay, including, like, watermarks and like the heat sensitive things and things, because he probably was one of the biggest perpetrators of check kiting. So, the idea was, so back in the, in the 60s, when you wrote a check, it would go to a federal bank as it was routed, okay, right? So, you know you have that routing number on your check, yeah, right. It would, that number tells banks how to route the check for payment. Okay, okay. Today it's done digitally. So, when you go to your grocery store or whatever, a lot of times, they'll just zip that check through a little reader, and then from that point forward, it's all, they'll even hand the check back to you. Oh, yeah, right. But back in the day, back in the 60s, that check literally got put into a mailbag and got sent to a federal bank, and then that federal bank would forward it on to the bank that it was from, and it took time, okay, right? Sometimes it would take two weeks. So, what would happen is, people figured out that they could write a check for like, okay, let's say that I have $100 in my account, okay, okay, I could write a check for $1,000 right? And I knew that I had two weeks to get the rest of that money, and then the rest of the money in there, okay, right? The check kiting comes in where you have, I can't believe I'm not trying to teach you how to do this. I'm just telling you what it is that, yeah, I've learned itself this, yeah, the check kiting comes in where you have multiple accounts in different federal zones. Okay, so you would have a bank account in California, a bank account in New York, a bank account, say, in Florida, okay, and you would write a check to that bank for $1,000 okay, right? Knowing that it would take two weeks to get there. After a week and a half, you would write a check from bank B for $1,000 to that cover, to cover your expenses from bank C. Okay, at bank C, you wait a week and a half, you write a check from bank C to cover the expenses in bank A. So, that money floats between the banks, but you never actually have that money. Okay? It's always so it's a timing thing, yeah, it's always kiting over. So, they called it check kiting. Okay, the idea of you float this check up in the air, there's nothing there. But by the time that it gets to the bank and that expense comes out, that money comes out, but the money leaves again, then goes to another bank, and you're not actually using that money, okay? It's, it's, it's fraud, yeah, oh yeah, it's, it's absolutely fraud.

Jeff Matevish  49:01  
So, so and that's harder today with, with everything being digital, yeah.

Drew Thomas  49:05  
I would have to argue it's almost impossible to do that today. Uh, thankfully. Yeah, okay, but, but, yeah, go back and watch Catch Me If You Can if you've never, I mean...

Jeff Matevish  49:13  
I have never watched it, no, great movie. I'll have to go watch it.

Drew Thomas  49:16  
It's a little on the longer side, like, budget, like, two and a half hours, okay, but that's fine. Some of it's a little embellished, but, but that part of it is, is pretty accurate. I have to go watch it. Yeah. So, all right.

Jeff Matevish  49:26  
We touched on the digital fraud part, adding to that, before that transaction goes through, sometimes your bank will look, or most of the times, your bank will look at background information, like the, the date that that, that transaction went through, or the IP address, or to make sure that it's really you the who did that transaction. Yeah, but there are some cases of like, friendly fraud it's called, where a cardholder makes a purchase by accident. Sometimes this is unsupervised child making an in-app purchase, oh, yeah, letting a free trial run out and into a paid period. And we covered that a little. It on an episode of 2 Cents.

Drew Thomas  50:02  
Yeah, about not having remote subscription, right there, right, yeah.

Jeff Matevish  50:06  
Forgetting about an automatic renewal subscription, or buyer's remorse, yeah? Yeah. Though there's, there's some cases of fraud that are not really fraud, but your bank may flag it as fraud, but it's just precautionary. So, it's probably a good thing that you know, it's not a bad thing that you know, you getting flagged for fraud. Sometimes it's a good thing your, your bank is being very cautious. Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Drew Thomas  50:25  
Yeah, that's absolutely true. Yeah. You know what? I would have to probably guess this is a good time of year for a lot of those subscriptions and things like that, like, don't, don't let those just continue to roll over if you're not using them, save a ton of money sometimes by just getting rid of stuff you're not using that you've forgotten about. Yeah, you know, yeah.

Jeff Matevish  50:41  
Yeah. And there's, that's a good time of year too, I've already started getting them, getting the text messages from UPS or USPS. Your parcel has been stuck at this center, click this link. I mean, because everybody's buying stuff online right now. So, who knows, you know, hey, that could be a legitimate thing. It's usually not. But, yeah, people get tripped up on those things.

Drew Thomas  51:00  
Yeah, you're absolutely right. Yeah, be careful about that stuff. And you know, just one other PSA, you know, this is the time of year too where people get desperate for something. Their child wants a particular toy, their husband wants a particular whatever, and you start seeing that item, whatever it is, on some website you've never heard of before, and they say, oh, well, they're sold out everywhere else, but we have them here, right, right. And if you just give me all your credit card information, I'll be happy to send you one. And it's just if you're not, use legitimate websites, yeah, you know, if, if every store in the country, if, if Amazon and Walmart and Boscov's or Macy's or whatever, if they're all sold out, but some yada yada website says they have 7,500 of them, question it. It's probably not legit.

Jeff Matevish  51:52  
Right. Yeah, you know, all right, yeah. I think we're at the end of our who, what, where, when, whys and hows.

Drew Thomas  51:59  
And hows. Well, you know what? This has been a fantastic year, and Jeff, I mean, you have definitely become a legitimate, honest to God, co-host of the show. We really appreciate that. I mean, it's, it's and you do, and honestly, you do a ton of work behind the scenes with all the editing and, and production and everything that you do. So, thank you very much. I definitely appreciate it. It is appreciated. And yeah, so, and if you haven't been listening, well, now is a good time to start. Go back and check out some of the episodes that we mentioned. Check out ones we didn't mention. What were some of your favorite episodes?

Jeff Matevish  52:31  
Oh, George Kamel, definitely.

Drew Thomas  52:34  
Yeah. George Kamel, that was a good episode.

Jeff Matevish  52:36  
Got to love that one.

Drew Thomas  52:36  
Yeah, definitely.

Jeff Matevish  52:37  
Come on, it's George.

Drew Thomas  52:38  
Maybe we can get George back again. You never know. You never, we'll tag him in this, yeah. Maybe if he listens this far, be like, hey, George, you're invited back. Yeah.

Jeff Matevish  52:47  
How about yours?

Drew Thomas  52:48  
You know, I like, I mean, I like a lot of the longer form episodes, like the George Kamel one, they're very informative. But I like some of the 2 Cents stuff that we do too, even though I looked uneducated, the Gen Z terminology was good, that was a fun one, that was a fun episode.

Jeff Matevish  53:03  
That was a really fun one. Yeah, all right, well, the Saint Francis guys were good too. I always enjoy them.

Drew Thomas  53:08  
They're great friends of the show. They really are. And now that our show's been on long enough, we can say stuff like that, because they've been here multiple times. They have, they sure have. So, you know, they, they are definitely great friends of the show, and we want to have them back again. Yeah. So, yeah, so happy holidays, Jeff.

Jeff Matevish  53:21  
Happy holidays. Happy New Year, Happy New Year, and we'll talk to you next year. Okay, okay.

Drew Thomas  53:35  
This podcast focuses on having valuable conversations on various topics related to banking and financial health. The podcast is grounded in having open conversations with professionals and experts with the goal of helping to take some of the mystery out of financial and related topics, as learning about financial products and services can help you make more informed financial decisions. Please keep in mind that the information contained within this podcast and any resources available for download from our website or other resources relating to Bank Chats is not intended and should not be understood or interpreted to be financial advice. The host, guests, and production staff of Bank Chats expressly recommend that you seek advice from a trusted financial professional before making financial decisions. The host of Bank Chats is not an attorney, accountant, or financial advisor, and the program is simply intended as one source of information. The podcast is not a substitute for a financial professional who is aware of the facts and circumstances of your individual situation. Our goal with the podcast is to be entertaining and educational. Sometimes we are more successful with the one or the other, but I think that Bank Chats has begun to really grow into its clothes, for the lack of a better phrase. It may not always be appealing to make smart decisions about money. Saving for a rainy day instead of buying the latest gadget or toy, for example, but being financially responsible is going to make you far happier in the long run. I sincerely want to take some time to thank Jeff Matevish all of his hard work in being the producer, editor and co-host of the show. He makes my silliness work. I also want to thank those of you who have downloaded and listened to the podcast this year. Believe it or not, episodes of the show have now been downloaded and listened to more than 2,000 times. Hopefully we've made a difference. AmeriServ Presents: Bank Chats is produced and distributed by AmeriServ Financial Incorporated. Music by Rattlesnake, Millo, and Andrey Kalitkin. You can find all of our episodes on ameriserv.com/bankchats, or by simply searching for us on your favorite podcast app. For now, I'm Drew Thomas, so long.