Short answer: In a public-data screen of U.S. banks and public U.S. bank holding companies above $10 billion in assets, the fastest business-mix changes around the 2023 regional-bank reset were concentrated in institutions where more than one composition line moved at once: loans, deposits, borrowings, securities, and fee dependence.
Scope: the primary window is Q4 2022 to Q4 2023, using quarterly public Call Report-style data, company disclosures, and FDIC transaction notices. Truist is included as a 2024 watchlist case because its fee-mix change closed after the 2023 screen window. This is a business-mix ranking, not a buy/sell list.
| Rank | Bank | What changed fastest | Evidence from public data | Why it matters |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | First Citizens BancShares / First-Citizens Bank & Trust | Customer segment, loan mix, deposits, and scale | The SVB transaction added an estimated $106.6 billion of assets, $68.5 billion of loans, and $56.0 billion of customer deposits; First Citizens also created an SVB segment for the acquired business.[3] | The historical peer set changed overnight. A bank that previously screened as a large regional now needed to be read partly as a technology, venture, fund-banking, and private-banking franchise. |
| 2 | New York Community Bancorp / Flagstar | Commercial loan share, funding structure, liquidity posture, and regulatory peer group | Commercial loans moved from 33% of total loans at year-end 2022 to 46% at year-end 2023. Assets rose from $90.1 billion to $116.3 billion, wholesale borrowings rose $6.7 billion from Q3 2023, and the company cut its common dividend after a Q4 loss and reserve build.[5] | This was not ordinary growth. The bank shifted from a multifamily-heavy specialty profile toward a larger commercial-bank profile while also preparing for the demands of crossing $100 billion in assets. |
| 3 | Banc of California / PacWest | Funding repair and balance-sheet repositioning | After the PacWest merger, Q4 2023 loans rose 16% from the prior quarter, deposits rose 14%, noninterest-bearing deposits improved from 21% to 26% of deposits, borrowings fell 54%, wholesale funding fell from 28% to 17% of assets, and the company completed $6.1 billion of asset sales plus $8.6 billion of high-cost funding paydowns.[6] | This was a fast mix change driven by repair, not expansion. The key signal was lower wholesale funding dependence paired with a better deposit mix. |
| 4 | JPMorgan Chase / First Republic | Absolute loan and deposit mix, especially wealth and jumbo-mortgage exposure | JPMorgan Chase acquired about $173 billion of loans and $30 billion of securities and assumed about $92 billion of deposits from First Republic.[7] FDIC reported First Republic had $229.1 billion of assets and $103.9 billion of deposits shortly before failure.[8] | As a percentage of JPMorgan Chase, the change was smaller than the failed-bank deals above. In absolute dollars, it was one of the largest mix shifts in the banking system. |
| Watchlist | Truist | Revenue mix and securities mix | In May 2024, Truist completed the sale of its remaining Truist Insurance Holdings stake, received about $10.1 billion of after-tax cash proceeds, recorded an approximate $4.7 billion after-tax gain, sold $27.7 billion of lower-yielding securities, and reinvested $18.7 billion into shorter-duration securities.[9] | Truist became less insurance-fee-heavy and more focused on core banking economics. Lower fee diversification can still be strategic if it buys capital flexibility and improves balance-sheet returns. |
Methodology: What the Screen Counts
The clean way to find fast-changing banks is to measure composition, not just growth. A $5 billion loan increase at JPMorgan Chase may be less meaningful as a mix change than a $500 million category shift at a $10 billion bank. The screen should ask: what share of the bank changed?
| Method item | Definition used here |
|---|---|
| Universe | U.S. FDIC-insured banks and public U.S. bank holding companies above $10 billion in assets. Failed-bank acquisitions and merger-driven changes are tagged separately because they can overwhelm organic trend analysis. |
| Primary data | FDIC BankFind / FDIC financial data, FFIEC Call Report concepts, company earnings releases, 10-Ks, and FDIC failed-bank transaction notices.[1][2] |
| Reporting cadence | Quarterly, with the main lookback from Q4 2022 to Q4 2023. For late-2023 mergers, Q3 2023 to Q4 2023 is also useful because the quarter-end balance sheet captures the transaction. |
| Peer-set logic | Compare banks by asset size, geography, charter/model, and business type. A bank that changes customer segment or crosses a major asset threshold should be re-compared against its new peer group. |
| Screen cutoffs | Flag a bank when any loan-category share moves by at least 500 basis points, noninterest-bearing deposit share moves by at least 300 basis points, borrowings-to-assets moves by at least 200 basis points, securities-to-assets moves by at least 500 basis points, or noninterest income share of revenue moves by at least 400 basis points. |
Those cutoffs are screening thresholds, not regulatory standards. They are designed to tell an analyst where to spend time. The key is the combination: a lending shift plus a funding shift is more important than either one in isolation.
Use Supervisory Thresholds as Context, Not a Ranking System
The previous version of this article leaned too hard on a dense, formula-first paragraph. Here is the cleaner version: regulatory thresholds can help frame risk, but they should not be confused with a fastest-changing-bank score.
| Measure | Plain-English use | Important caveat |
|---|---|---|
| Construction, land development, and other land loans / total risk-based capital >= 100% | A concentration screen for construction-heavy CRE exposure. | The 2006 interagency CRE guidance says this may prompt further supervisory analysis. It is not a hard cap.[10][11] |
| Total CRE / total risk-based capital >= 300%, plus CRE growth >= 50% over 36 months | A way to spot CRE concentration that has also been growing quickly. | The growth condition matters. A static 300% ratio is not the same as a rapidly expanding CRE book.[11] |
| Uninsured deposit reporting | A funding-quality check, especially after the 2023 failures. | There is no universal 50% uninsured-deposit tripwire in the 2006 CRE guidance. FDIC has separately emphasized accurate uninsured-deposit reporting and requested comment on more granular deposit data.[12][13] |
| Revenue concentration score | HHI_rev = (net interest income / revenue)^2 + (noninterest income / revenue)^2. Lower means more balanced; higher means more concentrated. | This is an analyst tool. It says whether revenue mix is changing, not whether the change is good. |
What the Fast Movers Have in Common
1. The biggest changes are often identity changes
Fast business-mix change is not always a bank reaching for yield. Sometimes the bank becomes a different institution. First Citizens after SVB, NYCB after Flagstar and Signature-related assets, and Banc of California after PacWest all required a fresh peer set. Historical averages became less useful because the denominator, customer base, and strategic problem changed.
That is the first original insight from this screen: the most important mix changes often invalidate the old comparison set. If the bank is now funded differently, lending into different sectors, or regulated against a different peer group, last year’s efficiency ratio or margin history may be stale evidence.
2. Funding repair can screen as fast change
Banc of California is a good example of why fast change is not automatically negative. A screen that only looks for movement would flag the bank because deposits, borrowings, wholesale funding, and asset sales all moved quickly. But the direction matters. Borrowings fell, wholesale funding reliance fell, and noninterest-bearing deposit share improved. That is a repair story more than a growth story.
In practice, analysts should separate three funding patterns: a bank replacing low-cost deposits with expensive funding, a bank shrinking higher-cost funding after stress, and a bank using temporary liquidity to bridge an acquisition. Those are different stories even when the ratios move by similar amounts.
3. Fee diversification is not always better
Revenue mix is easy to oversimplify. More noninterest income is not automatically higher quality, and less noninterest income is not automatically worse. Truist’s insurance sale reduced exposure to a valuable fee engine, but it also produced capital and balance-sheet flexibility. The real question is whether the remaining earnings stream is more durable after considering capital, funding, and reinvestment.
That is why a fee-mix screen should not stop at noninterest income as a percentage of revenue. It should ask whether the fee line is recurring, capital-light, connected to core customers, and still owned by the bank.
How to Read Lending, Funding, and Fee Shifts Together
| Signal | Healthier version | Riskier version | Follow-up question |
|---|---|---|---|
| Loan-category share rises quickly | The growth is relationship-led, diversified within the category, and funded by stable deposits. | The growth is concentrated, cyclical, or paired with rising borrowings and thinner reserves. | Did the bank change risk appetite, or did another book simply run off? |
| Noninterest-bearing deposits fall | The bank offsets the decline with sticky operating deposits or deliberate balance-sheet shrinkage. | The bank replaces low-cost funding with CDs, brokered deposits, FHLB advances, or other wholesale funding. | Is the margin pressure temporary beta catch-up or a structural franchise issue? |
| Borrowings-to-assets rises | Borrowings are a temporary liquidity bridge around a transaction or market stress. | Borrowings fund asset growth because relationship deposits are not keeping pace. | What happens to earnings if the bank has to keep that funding longer than planned? |
| Securities-to-assets changes sharply | The bank is shortening duration, improving liquidity, or repositioning lower-yielding securities after creating capital room. | The bank is taking losses without enough capital, liquidity, or earnings benefit to justify the move. | Is the securities change paired with a measurable improvement in future NII or risk sensitivity? |
| Noninterest income share moves | Recurring fee lines grow from treasury, trust, wealth, payments, or durable customer activity. | The movement comes from one-time gains, mortgage volatility, sale accounting, or discontinued business lines. | Would the revenue mix look similar one year later? |
A Practical Screening Workflow
- Start with a peer group by asset size, geography, and model.
- Measure trailing-twelve-month share changes across loan categories, deposit types, borrowings, securities, and noninterest income.
- Tag event-driven changes separately from organic changes.
- Review whether asset growth and funding changes point in the same direction.
- Check whether margin, reserve coverage, liquidity, and capital moved enough to support the new mix.
- Read the outliers manually before drawing conclusions. The screen finds the change; it does not explain the intent.
For teams that want to run this type of comparison without rebuilding every ratio by hand, the peer-comparison view in Banking is the natural next step. Use the public-data screen to find the banks whose old story may no longer describe the current balance sheet.
FAQ
Does fastest-changing mean riskiest?
No. Fast change is a review trigger, not a verdict. Banc of California’s Q4 2023 mix change included funding repair. NYCB’s Q4 2023 disclosures showed a much more complicated mix shift involving scale, commercial lending, borrowings, reserves, and dividend policy. Direction and context matter.
Should merger-driven banks be excluded from a screen?
No, but they should be tagged. Excluding them misses some of the largest real changes in the banking system. Mixing them with organic growers, however, can make the ranking misleading.
What is the single most useful first-pass signal?
Look for a loan-category share increase paired with weaker funding mix. A bank growing a concentrated loan book while noninterest-bearing deposits fall and borrowings rise deserves review before the headline earnings trend gets the full market’s attention.
Sources
- [1] FDIC BankFind Suite API documentation: https://api.fdic.gov/banks/docs – public API documentation for FDIC bank financial data.
- [2] FDIC Bank Financial Reports / Call Reports overview: https://www.fdic.gov/resources/bankers/bank-financial-reports – overview of quarterly Call Reports and their regulatory purpose.
- [3] First Citizens BancShares Q1 2023 earnings release: https://ir.firstcitizens.com/news-and-events/newsroom/news-details/2023/First-Citizens-BancShares-Reports-First-Quarter-2023-Earnings/default.aspx – acquired SVB assets, loans, deposits, and new SVB segment disclosure.
- [4] FDIC SVB Bridge Bank transaction notice: https://www.fdic.gov/news/press-releases/2023/pr23023.html – FDIC notice on First Citizens assuming deposits and loans of Silicon Valley Bridge Bank.
- [5] NYCB / Flagstar 2023 results release: https://ir.flagstar.com/news-and-events/news-releases/press-release-details/2024/NEW-YORK-COMMUNITY-BANCORP-INC.-REPORTS-RECORD-RESULTS-FOR-2023/default.aspx – loan mix, assets, deposits, borrowings, provision, and dividend disclosure.
- [6] Banc of California Q4 2023 results release: https://investors.bancofcal.com/news-releases/news-release-details/banc-california-inc-reports-fourth-quarter-2023-financial – PacWest merger, funding mix, asset sales, borrowings, and deposit mix.
- [7] JPMorgan Chase First Republic acquisition release: https://www.jpmorganchase.com/ir/news/2023/jpmc-acquires-substantial-majority-of-assets-and-assumes-certain-liabilities-of-first-republic-bank – loans, securities, deposits, and transaction details.
- [8] FDIC First Republic transaction notice: https://www.fdic.gov/news/press-releases/2023/pr23034.html – First Republic failure, asset and deposit totals, and JPMorgan Chase assumption.
- [9] Truist TIH sale and securities repositioning release: https://ir.truist.com/2024-05-07-Truist-completes-sale-of-Truist-Insurance-Holdings-and-executes-strategic-balance-sheet-repositioning – insurance sale proceeds, capital impact, securities sale, reinvestment, and NII estimate.
- [10] Federal Reserve SR 07-1: https://www.federalreserve.gov/boarddocs/srletters/2007/SR0701.htm – January 4, 2007 supervisory letter on CRE concentration guidance.
- [11] OCC Bulletin 2006-46: https://www.occ.gov/news-issuances/bulletins/2006/bulletin-2006-46.html – interagency CRE concentration screening criteria.
- [12] FDIC estimated uninsured deposits reporting expectations: https://www.fdic.gov/news/financial-institution-letters/2023/estimated-uninsured-deposits-reporting-expectations – July 2023 guidance on accurate uninsured-deposit reporting.
- [13] FDIC Request for Information on Deposits statement: https://www.fdic.gov/news/speeches/2024/request-information-deposits – July 2024 statement on deposit composition, uninsured deposits, and liquidity monitoring.