While banks continued to see deposit growth over the past year, it lagged the five-year average for annual growth, according to the latest issue of the FDIC Quarterly. Reviewing figures from the latest FDIC Summary of Deposits, the article noted that year-over-year merger-adjusted deposit growth at community banks was at 5.5%, on par with the five-year annual rate of 4.9%. Non-community banks, meanwhile, saw deposit growth of 3.9%. It was the second year in a row that community banks’ deposit growth outpaced that of non-community banks.
From June 2018 to June 2019, all insured deposits nationwide rose by $510 billion, or roughly 4.2%. As bank consolidation continued and branch networks continued to shrink, deposits per institution increased by 8.4% and deposits per office rose 6.2%.
The total number of bank branches in the U.S. fell over the last year by 1.9%, a slightly slower rate than the previous two years but still more than the five-year average annual decline of 1.8%. Unlike the previous year, 2019’s decrease was driven largely by community banks (2.3%) versus non-community banks (1.7%), the FDIC noted. However, over the past five years, the decline in branches was slowest in rural areas—just 6.1%, compared with a 9.2% reduction in metropolitan area branches and an 8.5% dip in micropolitan areas.
