Bank Director | Benefit Program Archives

Leaving is an inevitable part of life. Everybody ages and, whether by choice or by circumstance, we won’t forever be doing what we are doing today. This law is true for your bank as much as it is for yourself. It is essential to take steps now to prevent the inevitable transitions that are in the future. As individuals, we are constantly questioning whether we are prepared for the next stage of life. “Have I saved enough for retirement?” “Is my estate in order?” As directors, we need to be making similar plans for our bank’s future.

Succession planning can be broken down into three areas: management succession, board succession and ownership succession.

Management Succession
When succession planning is first addressed by a bank, typically management succession is what comes to mind. This naturally includes the chief executive officer’s position, but should also include other vital roles in the bank such as chief financial officer, chief operating officer and your bank’s senior lending officers.

Some banks are challenged when trying to start a formal succession plan: “Who should you include and how should you start?” Banks should start with the most predictable event possible, the eventual retirement of current executives. Not all current executives will necessarily know the exact date they plan to retire, but an age range of 65 to 67 is a good start. As far as whom to include in the plan, it is important to remember that it is not necessary to name a successor now. Identifying a small pool of potential successors is often sufficient. But what banks need to remember is that part of a successful succession plan is ensuring that the people in your plan are still at the bank when you need them. Many banks are incorporating executive benefit/BOLI plans that have golden handcuffs in order to retain all potential successors in the succession plan.

Knowing what you should plan for is always beneficial, but when designing a formal succession plan, banks need to address other contingencies besides the eventual retirement of the current management team. Death, disability and other unexpected events may create a critical situation for those banks that don’t have an emergency succession plan in addition to their long-term succession plan. Depending on the readiness of those involved, the person who takes over running the bank in case of an emergency may very well not be the same person who is the identified successor in the long-term plan.

Board Succession
One of the most challenging aspects of succession planning is board succession. Many banks have mandatory retirement ages typically ranging from age 70 to 75. If your bank does not currently have a mandatory retirement age, you can use nonqualified benefit plans to provide a benefit to those who you may require to retire at a specific age. This can facilitate their retirement from the board in a respectful and dignified way. You may also consider grandfathering the existing board members from a new policy you wish to implement. If that step is taken, the bank still needs to recruit young directors in preparation for the succession of the aging board. In the current regulatory environment, the role of the director is much more involved than in previous years. Often, the most successful banks have diversity on their boards, including various ages and backgrounds, to bring different perspectives regarding the strategic direction of the bank. One concept that seems to be successful for many of our clients is creating an advisory board made up of younger, successful, local business men and women to assist the bank in spreading its marketing footprint. They also typically provide great insight into the needs of the younger generation of bank customers. And many of them bring potentially profitable customers to the bank. As directors reach the mandatory retirement age, the board may recruit full-time directors from the advisory board, which makes for a much smoother transition.

Ownership Succession
Though many owners do not share their ownership succession plan with the rest of the board or key members of management, it is helpful to know how to plan for the succession of the bank. Utilizing nonqualified benefit plans for key management is beneficial in keeping the management team in place during the ownership succession of the bank.
Open communication is a key factor when considering all forms of succession planning. The more people are aware of the planning that banks are doing, the more comfortable both employees and customers will be during any portion of a transition of succession.

Bank-owned life insurance (BOLI) has undergone a number of changes since it was first introduced in the early 1980s. The number of carriers offering BOLI was a handful in the 1980s, increased to 20 or so in the 1990s and 2000s, and since has decreased to 8 to 10 active carriers as a number of insurers have exited the market or are currently sitting on the sidelines due to the low rate environment.

As competition for attractive investments has increased due to low yields, many carriers have moderately increased duration. Interestingly, several carriers have reduced purchases of below investment grade securities as the yield spread available for them has decreased to the point where the investment return does not justify the increased risk.

On the sales front, in the first six months of this year, there was a 10 percent increase in the number of banks purchasing BOLI compared to a similar period in 2015. Despite the increase in BOLI purchases, there was a decline in the number of banks purchasing the hybrid separate account product as most banks opted for general account.

As the financial crisis passed and banks become more comfortable with the long-term credit quality of carriers, data shows that fewer banks selected hybrid account policies than in the past, which have a mix of variable and general account properties.

Some aspects of the market have, however, remained consistent over time: there have been steady annual increases in both the amount of BOLI assets held by banks and in the percentage of banks holding BOLI assets.

The focus of this article is to look more closely at the state of the market as of June 30, 2016, including changes that have occurred between June 30, 2015 and June 30, 2016 to help track market trends.

New Purchases of BOLI
IBIS Associates, an independent market research firm, publishes a report analyzing BOLI sales based on information obtained from insurers that market BOLI products. According to the IBIS Associates BOLI Report for the period January 1, 2016 to June 30, 2016:

During the first six months of 2016, 553 banks purchased BOLI. The 553 banks included institutions purchasing it for the first time as well as additional purchases by banks that already own BOLI. This was a 10 percent increase over the 502 banks that purchased BOLI during the same time period in 2015.
New BOLI premium from banks amounted to $1.78 billion as of June 30, 2016. During a similar six month period in 2015, the total was $2.10 billion or $320 million higher. The difference is attributable to one large variable separate account purchase in the first half of 2015 ($400 million).
General account purchases dominated the market during the first half of 2016. Of the $1.78 billion in new BOLI premium, $1.65 billion (92.8 percent) was invested in general accounts. Hybrid product purchases amounted to $75.8 million (4.3 percent) while variable separate account purchases (where the investment risk is held by the policyholders and investment gains flow directly to them rather than the insurance carrier) were only $51.4 million (2.9 percent).
During the period July 1, 2012 to June 30, 2014, 226 banks purchased a hybrid product while for the period July 1, 2014 to June 30, 2016, the number of banks with a hybrid product increased by just 42 banks.

The reasons cited by bankers for purchasing BOLI are that it provides competitive returns with superior credit quality. Current BOLI net yields are in the range of 3.00 percent to 3.75 percent which generates tax equivalent net yields of 4.85 percent to 6.05 percent for a bank in the 38 percent tax bracket. Income generated by BOLI can help offset the increasing costs of a bank’s benefit programs.

Status of Market
Based on a review of FDIC data, the September 2016 Equias Alliance/Michael White Bank-Owned Life Insurance Holdings Report, shows that as of June 30, 2016:

BOLI assets reached $159.0 billion reflecting a 3.8 percent increase from $153.1 billion as of June 30, 2015. Banks with between $1 billion and $10 billion in assets had the largest percentage increase in BOLI assets during this timeframe with 8.3 percent growth.
Of the 6,058 banks in the survey, 3,713 (61.3 percent) now report holding BOLI assets. This percentage has grown year after year. There is, however, a wide discrepancy in the percentage of banks holding BOLI by size category. For example, only 39.9 percent of banks with under $100 million in assets hold BOLI while 81.9 percent of banks with $1 billion to $10 billion in assets hold BOLI.

In summary, the positive trends in new purchases, growth in assets and usage of BOLI by banks continued in the first half of 2016.

The Three Critical Areas of Succession Planning

The Bank-Owned Life (BOLI) Insurance Market is Changing: Here’s How