August 9, 2022

The Board of Directors for Zia Trust, Inc., located in Albuquerque, New Mexico,is pleased to appoint Paul Reardon as Chief Executive Officer for the company, effective June 1, 2022. Paul takes over for Ed Kraft, retiring after 20+years as the leader of Zia Trust and a 50+ year career in business.

Lonnie Talbert Named CEO of the ATM Industry Association The ATM Industry Association (ATMIA) recently announced the appointment of its new CEO Lonnie Talbert, Past President of the New Mexico Bankers Association. He will succeed long-time incumbent CEO Mike Lee following his retirement at the end of June. For over three decades, Talbert has enjoyed

Pioneer Bank has been awarded on the Forbes list of Best-In-State Banks 2022. This prestigious award is presented by Forbes and Statista Inc., the world-leading statistics portal and industry ranking provider. The awards list was announced on June 21, 2022, and can currently be viewed on the Forbes website. Pioneer Bank was ranked #1 in New Mexico and also earned this achievement in 2020.

Ongoing improvements and expansion of digital banking are redefining consumer relationships with their financial institutions. This paradigm shift has led to an ongoing concern – how can financial institutions make up for dwindling interpersonal time and meaningfully build consumer engagement?

Often, using new information can help broaden understanding. For community banks, learning there are international business customers in their own communities, but in unexpected places, may also open their eyes.

It would have been the largest acquisition of a community bank by a credit union – but word came in mid-June that the deal was off between VyStar Credit Union and Heritage Southeast Bancorporation after a failure to receive regulatory approvals. If completed, the deal would have made Jacksonville, Florida-based VyStar the 13th largest credit union in the nation.

Iwrote a bit about inflation this year, as it was a burgeoning problem beginning to pick up steam in the national dialogue, but now might be an appropriate time to return to the topic. Inflation has now become the topic du jour in national economic discourse, with pundits both expressing the need to bring it down and searching for the possible instigators. Let’s examine how the topic has continued to evolve in recent months, inflation’s origins and effects, and also how instructive it is to study the way it is discussed in much of our media.

There are three issues that I want to discuss in this article: Required Minimum Distributions, the SAFE Banking Act and State-Owned Bank Legislation.

This will be my final President’s Message as I complete my second tour of duty as NMBA President. I was honored to be asked to complete Lonnie Talbert’s term. As you probably know, Lonnie has recently been named CEO of the ATM Industry Association.