Tagged: banking

The websites of several major U.S. banks, including Wells Fargo and PNC, are under cyber attack today. Reports of trouble accessing online banking are pouring into the tracking website Sitedown.co, says founder Jeff Herdell.

"They're referred to as DDoS attacks," explains Herdell. "Hackers will take over many computers and direct floods of traffic at these bank sites in hopes that the service will be disrupted and go down temporarily. So it's more of a nuisance than anything, but it's very significant right now."

Headlines Thursday were full of news that Bank of America will cut 16,000 jobs by the end of the year. But the headlines can be misleading.

These layoff reports give the impression that every few months there's another major bloodletting at Bank of America. In fact, this latest 16,000 number - and others we've heard in recent months - are all part of the same job cuts announcement Bank of America made last September -  30,000 jobs it said it would cut.

At that time, Bank of America CEO Brian Moynihan described a plan to get the bloated bank back to its fighting weight.

Shops that offer short-term, small-dollar loans with annual percentage rates of 300 and 400 percent do not cluster on urban street corners in North Carolina like they do in other states. That's because this is one of just four states where payday lending is prohibited. 

But now a small regional bank - Regions Bank - has found a loophole.  Two loopholes, really.

"Were they not a bank, it would not be legal to make that loan here in the state," says Chris Kukla, a senior vice president at the Center for Responsible Lending.