The FDIC has only closed 16 banks nationwide in 2013 and none since early June.

And the number of banks under special FDIC scrutiny, which reached around 1,000 at one point, has been falling steadily.

Here’s much of the press release from Abshire Public Relations this morning noting that the FDIC has lifted the consent order for The Coastal Bank based here in Savannah:

The Coastal Bank announced today that the FDIC and the Georgia Department of Banking and Finance have removed the Consent Order which was entered into in May 2011. The Coastal Bank is the first bank in the Savannah area and one of very few in the southeast Georgia market to emerge from a formal order with the regulatory authorities.

“Long before the formal order was issued, we committed the necessary resources to improve the bankâ€s condition as quickly as possible,” said Jim A. LaHaise, president and CEO of The Coastal Bank. Throughout the two year tenure of the order, we maintained capital levels which were well in excess of the agreed upon minimums. This capital position allows us to continue to lend money to support customer needs in the communities we serve. We appreciate the support of our board of directors, management team and staff in reaching this significant accomplishment.”

Improvement of The Coastal Bankâ€s financial condition over the past two years has been driven primarily by the reduction of problem loans. The bank has made significant improvements in earnings performance, returning to profitability in 2012. This trend continues into 2013 with the bank reporting net income of $1.09 million through six months ended June 30, 2013 compared to $922,000 for the year ended December 31, 2012.

From Business in Savannah’s Former Savannah bank president, six others indicted for fraud | BusinessInSavannah.com:

The former president and six other officers of First National Bank of Savannah were indicted by a federal grand jury, accused of defrauding First National Bank and other banks out of millions of dollars.

The long-running scheme allegedly contributed to the failure of First National Bank in 2010, which will cost the FDIC deposit-insurance fund more than $90 million, according to a press release from the Department of Justice’s Southern District of Georgia.

Click on through to the link if you’re interested in reading the names of those indicted today.

The pace of bank failures fell dramatically in 2012, but it’s entirely possible — quite likely, in fact — that more Georgia banks will fail in 2013.

And I’d say it’s very likely that we’ll see more indictments like these against bank officers around the state.

Georgia has led the nation in bank failures since the housing bust.

I’ve been posting there about some issues that I used to post routinely about here, like bank failures. But relatively few people looked at posts on this blog about wonky economic issues regarding state revenue and such, and Peach Pundit provides a much bigger platform for putting issues out there.

My recent Savannah Morning News columns are in a feed in the right sidebar here, and you can click here if you’re interested in seeing all my posts at Peach Pundit.

A few of my recent posts that seem especially important, at least to me:

• Two more Georgia bank failures: First Cherokee Bank in Woodstock and Georgia Trust Bank in Buford
• Georgia revenue picture brighter than a year ago, but still well below pre-recession levels
• A look at the partisan leanings of each T-SPLOST region
• House banking committee chair joins his Senate counterpart in the FDIC spotlight
• The importance of state tax credits for filmmaking in Georgia

But it’s worth a read if you’re wondering why Georgia has so obviously failed in oversight of its banks.

Montgomery Bank & Trust in Ailey (just outside Vidalia), which failed Friday, was “saved” by an investment fund a year and a half ago that turns out to have been fraudulent. One of the directors of the bank also ran the fund, which swindled investors out of millions of dollars. That bank director, Aubrey Lee Price, is now missing and so is the money.

Greg Morris, state house banking committee chair, was a director at the bank and had previously been fined by the FDIC. State senate banking chair Jack Murphy was also director of a failed bank and was among those sued by the FDIC.

Click here for much more.

Security Exchange Bank, Marietta, Georgia, was closed today by the Georgia Department of Banking and Finance, which appointed the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation (FDIC) as receiver. To protect the depositors, the FDIC entered into a purchase and assumption agreement with Fidelity Bank, Atlanta, Georgia, to assume all of the deposits of Security Exchange Bank.

The two branches of Security Exchange Bank will reopen on Monday as branches of Fidelity Bank. Depositors of Security Exchange Bank will automatically become depositors of Fidelity Bank. [. . .]

As of March 31, 2012, Security Exchange Bank had approximately $151.0 million in total assets and $147.9 million in total deposits. In addition to assuming all of the deposits of the failed bank, Fidelity Bank agreed to purchase essentially all of the assets. [. . .]

The FDIC estimates that the cost to the Deposit Insurance Fund (DIF) will be $34.3 million. Compared to other alternatives, Fidelity Bank’s acquisition was the least costly resolution for the FDIC’s DIF. Security Exchange Bank is the 30th FDIC-insured institution to fail in the nation this year, and the fifth in Georgia. The last FDIC-insured institution closed in the state was Covenant Bank & Trust, Rock Spring, on March 23, 2012.

So far today, the FDIC has also shuttered The Farmers Bank of Lynchburg in Lynchburg, TN, and Putnam State Bank in Palatka, FL. Four banks failed last Friday, which makes the last couple of weeks the busiest in a long time for the FDIC.

Click here for the full list of bank failures.

Still, the FDIC is far behind the 2011 pace of closures, which was considerably behind 2010. Georgia continues to lead the nation in bank failures since the economic crisis, but the 5 closed so far this year is far lower than the 23 Georgia banks closed in 2011.

As I have said over and over and over, Georgia’s political leaders have made no visible attempt to understand the role of poor regulation or simply poor enforcement of regulation in Georgia’s banking crisis.

Covenant Bank & Trust, Rock Spring, Georgia, was closed today by the Georgia Department of Banking and Finance, which appointed the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation (FDIC) as receiver. To protect the depositors, the FDIC entered into a purchase and assumption agreement with Stearns Bank, National Association, St. Cloud, Minnesota, to assume all of the deposits of Covenant Bank & Trust. […]

As of December 31, 2011, Covenant Bank & Trust had approximately $95.7 million in total assets and $90.6 million in total deposits. In addition to assuming all of the deposits of the failed bank, Stearns Bank, National Association agreed to purchase essentially all of the assets. […]

The FDIC estimates that the cost to the Deposit Insurance Fund (DIF) will be $31.5 million. Compared to other alternatives, Stearns Bank, National Association’s acquisition was the least costly resolution for the FDIC’s DIF. Covenant Bank & Trust is the fourteenth FDIC-insured institution to fail in the nation this year, and the fourth in Georgia. The last FDIC-insured institution closed in the state was Global Commerce Bank, Doraville, on March 2, 2012.

Rock Spring is a town in northwest Georgia, south of Chattanooga.

Weâ€re about to end the 2012 legislative session, in which the stateâ€s leaders made no effort whatsoever to see why Georgia has led the nation in bank failures (and why these Georgia companies have cost the FDIC so many millions of dollars.

This long string of bank failures is an embarrassment to the state, and it wonâ€t go away if we ignore it. There are still dozens of banks in Georgia facing some sort of heightened regulator scrutiny and we will certainly see more failures before all this is over.

Global Commerce Bank, Doraville, Georgia, was closed today by the Georgia Department of Banking and Finance, which appointed the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation (FDIC) as receiver. To protect the depositors, the FDIC entered into a purchase and assumption agreement with Metro City Bank, Doraville, Georgia, to assume all of the deposits of Global Commerce Bank.

The three branches of Global Commerce Bank will reopen during their normal business hours beginning Saturday as branches of Metro City Bank. […]

As of December 31, 2011, Global Commerce Bank had approximately $143.7 million in total assets and $116.8 million in total deposits. In addition to assuming all of the deposits of the failed bank, Metro City Bank agreed to purchase approximately $79.0 million of the failed bank’s assets. The FDIC will retain the remaining assets for later disposition. […]

The FDIC estimates that the cost to the Deposit Insurance Fund (DIF) will be $17.9 million. Compared to other alternatives, Metro City Bank’s acquisition was the least costly resolution for the FDIC’s DIF. Global Commerce Bank is the 12th FDIC-insured institution to fail in the nation this year, and the third in Georgia. The last FDIC-insured institution closed in the state was Central Bank of Georgia, Ellaville, on February 24, 2012.

Georgia leads the nation in bank failures since 2008.

The Georgia legislature has taken no interest in looking at how state policies and/or enforcement contributed to so many failures.

Even after we work our way through all this, with the potential closure of another dozen or two banks, Georgia will probably still have more banks than we had a decade ago.

It’s clear, first off, that things are improving, despite the 76 bank failures in the state since 2007 — and despite at least 65 banks in the state operating under some sort of heightened regulator scrutiny.

Troubled banks are slowly but surely getting bad loans off their books, and more banks are turning profitable. For some details on those trends that are relevant to the Savannah area, check out Adam Van Brimmer’s Savannah Morning News pieces here and here.

And it’s also becoming clear that the nationwide picture is improving. Yes, there are 960 banks on the unofficial problem bank list maintained by surferdude808 and published by Calculated Risk, and there are probably even more banks than that in trouble. Periodically, the FDIC will shut down a bank that had never been mentioned in any public release as being under heightened scrutiny.

Those numbers are bad, but the relatively slow pace of closures inevitably means that most of the banks on the list are going to survive. From Calculated Risk:

The first two months of 2011 suggest that we could see fewer than 100 bank failures in the U.S. in 2012. That’s really good news for all those banks in need of time to clean up their balance sheets.

Still, I’m disappointed that there hasn’t been any political will in Georgia to take a hard look at why our banks got hit so much harder than our neighbors’. Check out the FDIC’s failed bank list. Just 6 banks have failed in Alabama, just 3 in Tennessee, just 7 in South Carolina.

So the good news is that most of the following banks will survive, based on current trends. But all of these banks in Georgia are operating under some sort of heightened scrutiny from regulators. Check out the unofficial problem bank list for more information on each.

• Atlantic National Bank Brunswick GA
• Bank of Atlanta Atlanta GA
• Bank of Newington Newington GA
• Bank of Wrightsville Wrightsville GA
• Capitol City Bank & Trust Company Atlanta GA
• Cherokee Bank, National Association Canton GA
• Citizens Bank & Trust Company Eastman GA
• Citizens State Bank Kingsland GA
• Columbus Community Bank Columbus GA
• Community Bank of Pickens County Jasper GA
• Community Bank of the South Smyrna GA
• CornerstoneBank Atlanta GA 5/17/2010
• Covenant Bank & Trust Rock Spring GA
• Douglas County Bank Douglasville GA
• Eastside Commercial Bank Conyers GA
• F & M Bank and Trust Company Manchester GA
• Farmers & Merchants Bank Lakeland GA
• Farmers & Merchants Bank Eatonton GA
• Farmers & Merchants Bank Statesboro GA
• Farmers State Bank Lumpkin GA
• First Bank of Dalton Dalton GA
• First Chatham Bank Savannah GA
• First Cherokee State Bank Woodstock GA
• First Covenant Bank Commerce GA
• First National Bank South Alma GA
• First National Bank of Decatur County Bainbridge GA
• First National Bank of Griffin Griffin GA
• First National Community Bank Chatsworth GA
• First State Bank Wrens GA
• Flint River National Bank Camilla GA
• Georgia Heritage Bank Dallas GA
• Georgia Primary Bank Atlanta GA
• Gwinnett Community Bank Duluth GA
• Heritage Bank Jonesboro GA
• Heritage First Bank Rome GA
• Montgomery Bank & Trust Ailey GA
• North Georgia National Bank Calhoun GA
• Northside Bank Adairsville GA
• Northwest Georgia Bank Ringgold GA
• Oconee State Bank Watkinsville GA
• Peoples Bank Lyons GA
• Peoples Community National Bank Bremen GA
• Pineland State Bank Metter GA
• PrimeSouth Bank Blackshear GA
• Providence Bank Alpharetta GA
• Queensborough National Bank & Trust Company Louisville GA
• Rabun County Bank Clayton GA
• Security Exchange Bank Marietta GA
• South Georgia Bank Glennville GA
• State Bank of Georgia Fayetteville GA
• Stephens Federal Bank Toccoa GA
• Sunrise Bank Valdosta GA
• The Bank of Georgia Peachtree City GA
• The Bank of Perry Perry GA
• The Brand Banking Company Lawrenceville GA
• The Citizens Bank Nashville GA
• The Citizens Bank of Forsyth County Cumming GA
• The Coastal Bank Savannah GA
• The Farmers Bank Forsyth GA
• The First National Bank of Polk County Cedartown GA
• The Heritage Bank Hinesville GA
• The Patterson Bank Patterson GA
• The Savannah Bank, National Association Savannah GA
• The Trust Bank Lenox GA
• The Woodbury Banking Company Woodbury GA