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"...The Farm Credit System got caught in a similar situation in the 1980s when it made loans based on the value of farm properties...a result of that difficult situation, Farm Credit changed the way it makes loans. Its lending officers now look at a farmer's ability to repay a loan from the farm's operations, not the value of the farm property..."
What a novel concept...:rolleyes:Apparently voluntary socialism [co-op] may actually work better than the involuntary [taxpayer pays, and pays, and pays, to bail out everyone] socialism?
Farm bank thrives amid crisis
By Ted Shelsby | Special to The Baltimore Sun
- December 21, 2008
- Our nation would not be in the midst of the greatest financial crisis since the Depression if we had more grain farmers, dairymen and poultry growers running our lending institutions.
That's paraphrasing a recent comment from Bob Frazee, chief executive officer of MidAtlantic Farm Credit, a regional unit of the national Farm Credit System, a farmer-owned cooperative banking system established by Congress in 1916 to serve agriculture and rural America.
While conventional banks are counting on a $700 billion bailout by the federal government to stay in business, Farm Credit is thriving.
Farm Credit's balance sheet is the envy of the banking industry. Net income for the six months ended June 30 is up nearly 20 percent to $1.55 billion from the same period last year.
Its credit quality remains very favorable with 98.4 percent of all loans ranked in the highest loan quality classification.
As of June 30, the cooperative banking system had more than $27 billion in capital, up more than 25 percent since the end of 2007.
Another way of measuring a lender's success, and one that has had more than its fair share of headlines in recent months, is foreclosures.
Conventional lenders reported nearly 8,000 foreclosures in Maryland during the three-month period ended Sept. 30, and that is with state programs aimed at keeping people in their homes.
By comparison, MidAtlantic Farm Credit, which serves most of Maryland and parts of Pennsylvania, West Virginia, Virginia and Delaware, has reported fewer than a dozen foreclosures over the past year...
By Ted Shelsby | Special to The Baltimore Sun
That's paraphrasing a recent comment from Bob Frazee, chief executive officer of MidAtlantic Farm Credit, a regional unit of the national Farm Credit System, a farmer-owned cooperative banking system established by Congress in 1916 to serve agriculture and rural America.
While conventional banks are counting on a $700 billion bailout by the federal government to stay in business, Farm Credit is thriving.
Farm Credit's balance sheet is the envy of the banking industry. Net income for the six months ended June 30 is up nearly 20 percent to $1.55 billion from the same period last year.
Its credit quality remains very favorable with 98.4 percent of all loans ranked in the highest loan quality classification.
As of June 30, the cooperative banking system had more than $27 billion in capital, up more than 25 percent since the end of 2007.
Another way of measuring a lender's success, and one that has had more than its fair share of headlines in recent months, is foreclosures.
Conventional lenders reported nearly 8,000 foreclosures in Maryland during the three-month period ended Sept. 30, and that is with state programs aimed at keeping people in their homes.
By comparison, MidAtlantic Farm Credit, which serves most of Maryland and parts of Pennsylvania, West Virginia, Virginia and Delaware, has reported fewer than a dozen foreclosures over the past year...