Rajinder Singh on banking industry
From What's good for economy generally good for banks, says BankUnited CEO · · CNBC Television
“I think of banking eventually evolving to a sort of a barbell structure of this industry: you're gonna have very large behemoth Universal banks like JP Morgan, Wells Fargo, BFA and so on, and you're gonna have more specialized banks like us which will cater to one or two or three niches and specialize and earn our economic return in those markets.”
On , Rajinder Singh, Chairman, President & Chief Executive Officer at BANKUNITED INC, spoke about banking industry during What's good for economy generally good for banks, says BankUnited CEO on CNBC Television.
About Rajinder Singh
Rajinder Singh, Chairman, President and CEO of BankUnited, discussed the bank's 10-year anniversary and its growth since its founding in 2009, which he described as "the perfect time to start a bank." He stated that "what's good for the economy is generally good for banks" but expressed uncertainty about the business cycle's duration. Singh noted conflicting signals, saying that while the bank's loan book and clients appear healthy, market indicators give "some pause." He assessed that trade disruption would have some impact on South Florida and New York economies but called it "more noise at this point than real trouble." Singh commented on the banking industry's structure, predicting a "barbell" evolution with very large universal banks and highly specialized banks like BankUnited. He noted that the U.S. has roughly 6,000 banks, a number he called "unique," and said consolidation is likely to continue. Regarding M&A, Singh described it as a "secondary strategy" for BankUnited, with the primary focus on organic growth. He observed that recent large acquisitions have not been "rewarded by shareholders," though he noted that two recent "mergers of equals" saw positive stock performance, while cautioning that such deals are "especially hard to pull off." On regulation, Singh said there has been no major deregulation of Dodd-Frank but that the "attitude of regulatory bodies" toward businesses has become "much more reasonable."