With a new Congress and administration arriving in Washington, ICBA and the nation’s community banks face a momentous opportunity to make significant changes to a regulatory system that is flat-out broken.

Most representatives of the broker-dealer industry have been suggesting to their customers, especially community banks, that their collection of bonds could be situated to perform pretty well in 2025.

As the number of acquisitions of community banks by credit unions skyrocketed at a shocking rate in 2024, ICBA has rightfully sounded the alarm to legislators and regulators. As a community banker, an S Corporation bank leader, and an Employee Stock Ownership Plan (ESOP) bank owner, this issue presents a real and present danger to my community and local communities nationwide.

While we in the financial services sector start thinking about monetary policy in the coming year, there’s a new wrinkle to consider. Many Fed-watchers, rate prognosticators, economists and even investors had been betting on substantially lower rates in 2025 for many months.

Hackers are leveraging emerging technology to find vulnerabilities in systems once thought impossible to exploit. As a technological renaissance pushes new methods of convenience and optimization, it’s crucial to remain vigilant in a continuously changing setting.

Recently, a board chair described to us his approach toward managing his board of directors and how he strives to improve overall corporate governance for the organization by focusing on “the three E’s.” By this, he meant that they ask directors to focus on board engagement, education, and evaluation.

We’ve seen a lot of shifts and change this year—the continued uptick in check fraud, the election, credit union acquisitions, etc.—but we community bankers are as steadfast, scrappy and resilient as ever.

This year we’ve doubled down on our commitment to year-round innovation—with the opening of our Center for Innovation in Atlanta, the rollout of two 10-week ThinkTECH Accelerators, and a host of specialized forums and showcases—in our effort to address our bankers’ most pressing business challenges and opportunities.

Standard Plan, Custom Plan, and Bank Compliance Bundle subscribers’ renewal invoices are due by Dec. 31 to maintain access to the Online Course Learning Management System. If you have not paid and are concerned a check payment will not arrive in time, you can pay online. Visit www.icba.org, log into your account (Member Login button in upper right), click on your name, scroll down to the open invoices, and pay. You may also call us at 800-422-7285 and we can take payment via credit card over the phone.

ICBA and community bankers focused much of our attention in 2023 on differentiating our industry in the wake of failures at larger institutions, while 2024 was all about elevating our positions on key issues at a time of intense political debate.