Unsanitized: The COVID-19 Report for July 15, 2020

Banks Judged On How They Treat People, For Once
Also, still no bailout oversight chair

 

JPMorgan Chase earned a "D" on the Committee for Better Banks'
coronavirus scorecard. (NewsBase/AP Photo)

First Response

If anyone knows something about the economy, it's banks, and they are
preparing for a long, slow recession

with a wave of loan defaults. Big banks have been stockpiling cash to
cover the losses. Despite this, JPMorgan Chase beat the estimates

on its earnings, with strong profits made in equity markets. The Fed
rescue can be seen directly profiting Wall Street here, and this was
true

for most banks
,
with the glaring exception of Wells Fargo. Bank windfalls

from no-risk fees in the PPP small business program have also boosted
the sector.

Typically, this earnings activity would yield banks a positive rating
from federal regulators. There are several ratings "scorecards"
used, the most prominent known as CAMELS, which measures a bank's
condition based on earnings (the E), capital adequacy (the C) and other
factors. But this year, in the wake of the crisis, banks had to contend
with a new scorecard, one based more on how banks treat customers and
their own workers.

The Committee for Better Banks, a coalition of frontline workers in bank
branches, put out its own scorecard
of the COVID-19 response of the twelve largest retail banks between
March and May. Only one, Fifth Third Bank, earned above a C, and four
banks-US Bank, Wells Fargo, PNC, and Santander-got an F.

The CBB looked at three major categories

to build the scorecard: how it handled small business lending, worker
protections, and customer protections. It used publicly available
information and data from its own members to construct it.

Read all of our Unsanitized reports here

Click to Support The American Prospect

If a bank canceled stock buybacks, facilitating more lending, it got 10
points. If it favored clients over non-clients with "concierge
treatment
"
in the PPP small business program, it lost points. On worker
protections, points were awarded for having a telework policy (including
for call centers), offering paid leave and hazard pay, social distancing
and enhanced cleaning policies in branches, and announcing no layoffs in
2020. For retail customers, CBB looked at relief from bank fees,
compliance with federal policy on one-year foreclosure forbearance and
eviction moratoria under the CARES Act, and forbearance on student and
auto loans.

The results were pretty stark. Eight banks didn't comply with the
one-year foreclosure forbearance from the CARES Act; some would only
execute the policy if the customer used the word "forbearance." Six
banks would not commit to retaining workers through 2020. No bank
maintained a consistent policy with others on worker protections,
suggesting a "go-it-alone" approach. Some workers said they still
face unrealizable sales goals, even during the pandemic, while not
receiving proper protections. "While Wells Fargo was fighting to get
its asset cap lifted during the early stages of the pandemic, I was
fearing for my and my family's health as I continued to go into the
office day after day," said Alex Ross, a loan specialist with Wells
Fargo.

"Banks have the resources to weather this storm," said Nick Wiener,
lead organizer with CBB, in an interview with the Prospect. "They can
do more than they are to make sure workers get out of this OK."

The Committee for Better Banks originated with bank workers seeking to
have a greater voice, not only in improving their lot through pressuring
on employers, but to hold to account the actions banks take on customers
and build a better financial system. It's a testament to the power the
CBB has built that, when they presented a preview of the scorecard to
the banks, several of them-including banks they had little prior
relationship with-responded and sent information to improve their
score.

"We were pleasantly shocked," Wiener said. JPMorgan, CapitalOne,
Bank of America, and Fifth Third were among those engaging. (Wells Fargo
wasn't.) "I think that's a positive sign that they at least
weren't completely shut down on recognizing bank workers as legitimate
stakeholders," said Wiener.

Congresswoman Ayanna Pressley (D-MA) described the scorecard as "a
vital tool in holding the big banks accountable during this crisis and
pushing them to do more to protect the physical and economic health of
our communities."

Ultimately, CBB wants a sectoral union for bank workers. But in the near
term, they have imported an idea from, of all places, Brazil. They heard
from frontline workers at the Brazilian outposts of Santander that they
formed a crisis committee among workers and managers, sector-wide, to
lay out procedures and staffing levels at the bank. You rarely see such
coalitions in the United States, but it would give certainty to anxious
workers whose branches have confusing or vague policies. It could serve
as a model to handle ongoing crises.

No banks have thus far committed to a crisis committee for the U.S.
banking system. But the pandemic has shown banks making the impossible
possible, Wiener explained. Initially, banks said telework was
impossible for call centers, because calls had to be monitored. Then a
bunch of workers showed positive tests for coronavirus. "Almost the
next day they were able to telework," Wiener said. "Workers were
able to get laptops to work from home when the grocery stores couldn't
get eggs. When they are motivated, banks can move quickly and at a large
scale."

Support Independent, Fact-Checked Journalism

Odds and Sods

I was on Status Coup with Jordan Chariton
talking about the
dwindling days for federal relief and the next economic survival bill.
Watch here .

Yesterday Marcia Brown wrote the ICE decision
to
require foreign students whose college classes have moved online only to
leave the country. Later that day, the Trump administration rescinded
the decision. Marcia did a follow-up report, and here that is
.

Gabrielle Gurley has a great piece at the site today about the airflow
on buses
.
A longtime bus driver now working with a transit union has devised an
airflow system that protects passengers and drivers from breathing
recirculated air and risking potential COVID-19 infection. It's
fascinating.
All of our coronavirus coverage is at prospect.org/coronavirus
. And send me your thoughts and tips
via email .

We Depend on Your Donations

Days Without a Bailout Oversight Chair

110
.
Yes, we're at 110 days, and the leading candidate for the chair of the
Congressional Oversight Commission, former chairman of the Joint Chiefs
of Staff Joseph Dunford, dropped out of the running

yesterday. Not only did Dunford have absolutely no experience with
Federal Reserve lending or corporate bonds or any of the oversight
issues involved, but he's also on the board (of course) of Lockheed
Martin, and decided that the job would be "incompatible" with such a
commitment. So he has more integrity than Nancy Pelosi and Mitch
McConnell, who had no problem with appointing a board member of a giant
defense contractor to oversee a rescue program aimed at corporate titans
like... a giant defense contractor.

What a scandal that this hasn't gotten done yet. Once again,
Pelosi's main rationale early on for what Democrats got from the CARES
Act was oversight. 110 days later, that oversight hasn't even begun.

We Can't Do This Without You

Today I Learned

* Perhaps nobody's reputation after this crisis is more dubious than
Andrew Cuomo's
.
(New Republic)

* Pretty good results

from Moderna in its Phase 1 vaccine trial. (Axios)

* The White House's "Find Something New
" campaign just
drips with contempt for workers. (Associated Press)

* The Trump administration has taken away the CDC's power

to collect state data on coronavirus, instead having states send it
directly to D.C. (Gizmodo)

* Do you think the $100 million the government has doled out for
McKinsey advice

on coronavirus response has been well spent? (ProPublica)

* There couldn't be a more irrelevant contretemps right now than the
war on Dr. Fauci
.
(The Daily Beast)

* Max Abelson's coronavirus discussions with a billionaire

are fascinating. (Bloomberg Businessweek)

* A baby caught coronavirus in the womb
,
and recovered (so did Mom). (New York Times)

**Click the social links below to share this newsletter**

 

[link removed]

 

[link removed]

 

[link removed]

 

[link removed]

 

[link removed]

 

[link removed]

YOUR TAX DEDUCTIBLE DONATION SUPPORTS INDEPENDENT JOURNALISM

Copyright (C) 2020 The American Prospect. All rights reserved.
_________________

Sent to [email protected]

Unsubscribe:
[link removed]

The American Prospect, Inc., 1225 I Street NW, Suite 600, Washington, DC xxxxxx, United States