The Institutional Risk Analyst

One reason that we believe that consumer loss rates are so low is that more aggressive lenders like HAPN and many others are ready and willing to provide unsecured financing to consumers. Given the signs of stress we see building in the private residential loan channel, we'd be more inclined to take the short side of HAPN -- especially if they are so anxious to take risk in home improvement lending.

In Q1 2026, the top seven banks continued to see asset returns decline, but funding costs fell even more. Net interest margin (NIM) decreased from the prior quarter to 3.31 percent, but loan growth driven by AI nonbank lending continued, rising 7.1 percent from the same quarter in 2025.

“One reason why bank credit statistics look so good is that the markets remain awash in liquidity, forcing asset prices up and default rates down,” notes Whalen. "We estimate that there are now $3 trillion in unused loan commitments to non-depository financial institutions."

The aggressive behavior of some issuers is distorting pricing for loans in the secondary market and may be creating the circumstances for the next systemic “surprise” in the nonbank sector. To us, Exhibit A in the category of a potential nonbank default event is United Wholesale Mortgage (UWMC), aka “Countrywide II.”

Of course, in the muddled markets at present, there are a number of low-scoring banks which have done relatively well in recent weeks. The parent company of tiny Merchants Bank of Indiana, Merchants Bancorp (MBIN), for example, saw its stock price rise significantly in early 2026, 2x the S&P 500 over the past year, driven primarily by its inclusion in a major index and strong financial performance.

This change in posture by President Trump opens the way for Kevin Warsh to be confirmed by the Senate perhaps by May 15th. More important, it provides a way for Powell to retire, which opens a second governor seat on the Board. Big question: Even with the investigation by the DOJ ended, does the Trump White House have the votes to get Warsh confirmed?

On Capitol Hill, Kevin Warsh appeared before the Senate Banking Committee this week to consider his nomination as Fed Chairman. Warsh reiterated that Fed “monetary policy independence is essential.” But he got some rough questions from Democrats, especially ranking member Elizabeth Warren (D-MA) She asked whether he will be a “sock puppet” manipulated by President Trump. Warren called Warsh “uniquely ill-suited for the job as Fed chair,” but frankly Warren is uniquely unquali

“Private debt” gating retail investors is the whipping boy du jour, but not the canary in the coal mine, nor the real problem, nor the real risk. Over-investment and malinvestment in things like data centers or unprofitable business models that require cheap money and are based on hype and suspension of common sense, excessive government spending, inflation and currency debasement, populism and socialist rhetoric manifesting itself in real policy and tax decisions, these are

Bank earnings this week have been mostly what we expected, with income up, credit loss rates continuing to trend lower and most banks refusing to provide additional disclosure on private credit exposures. As the private credit mess proceeds in the weeks and months ahead, a lot of the “debt” in these deals will turn to equity – which is what it should’ve been all along.

As we noted in our discussion with Julie Hyman on Yahoo Finance this week, the big question facing banks in Q1 2026 is disclosure about private credit. The big losers in private credit are not banks, but rather institutional and retail investors who were lured into these wholly unsuitable, structurally illiquid investments by the false public statements made by the sponsors.

We infer the size of the NDFI portfolio of individual banks by subtracting the aggregate NDFI series of the FDIC from Other Loans & Leases. In 2010 when the FDIC first started gathering the data, NDFI loans were less than a quarter of the “other loans and leases” (OLL) category, but today they are 60% of OLL and growing fast.

Fed Vice Chair for Supervision Michelle Bowman outlined bank-friendly Basel endgame and GSIB surcharge proposals, reports Ian Katz at CapAlpha in Washington, which she said will be released in a week. Overall, the changes will result in a small decrease in capital requirements for the largest banks and more significant changes for smaller institutions. We’ll be responding to the request for comment on Basel III.

Institutional investors can and do abide by limits on redemptions for private equity and credit, at least for a while. Retail investors cannot and do not, and will run when there are clear signs of distress and illiquidity. Remember the deposit run at Silicon Valley Bank.

The equity of many banks traded off in January following Q4 2025 earnings. The earnings were not bad by any means, but some investors seemingly decided to take profits after a remarkable run in banks stocks going back to last October.

Large-cap tech stocks experienced the worst week since November, causing a split market where value-oriented stocks are gaining attention, while tech stocks and crypto tokens are being liquidated. Equity managers are rotating out of tech and into everything else, creating a cosmic imbalance that is difficult for the non-tech equity market to absorb.

The addition of Kevin Warsh as Fed Chairman does not change the ST calculus on the FOMC in terms of support for further rate cuts. Even as a former Governor, Warsh begins his term as leader of a minority on the Committee, especially if former Chairman Powell remains on the Board. This is why the inability of Trump to blame Powell for the astronomical increase in home prices, as we discuss below, is so remarkable.

GS had a remarkable year in 2025, as shown in the table below. It is good to see the firm back on track after the disastrous experiment in retail banking and credit cards. This is really one of the few pages in the GS public disclosure that has any useful information, which is a major reason that the Fed's Y-9C is must reading for analysts of Goldman Sachs.

But more to the point, the comingled worlds of private equity and credit may be the biggest scandal to hit Wall Street in a century. Most bank loans to PE sponsors "secured" by private company assets are actually non-recourse, so there is no recovery for the bank in the event of default. We think these factors are just some of the reasons that exposures to private equity and credit may be the most risky part of bank loan portfolios.

Only the Fed under Janet Yellen was dumb enough to buy $3 trillion in MBS, costing the taxpayer hundreds of billions in losses without really affecting mortgage rates. A mere $200 billion from Donald Trump is a rounding error, pure populist political pulp -- another progressive political display that will have zero impact on LT interest rates. In fact, the childish suggestions coming from the White House on housing may continue to push LT interest rates up.

Of note, JPM's CFO Barnum said in response to a question that “I haven't heard anything to suggest that the private [credit] deals are performing differently from the public deals. It probably is true at the margin that some of the new direct lending initiatives involve underwriting at slightly higher expected losses, and that's significant because, as we've been discussing here, the wholesale charge-off rate has been very, very low for a long time."