[aristotles]

Toronto Dominion Bank owns:
Online Stock Trading - TD Ameritrade
and
TD Bank

and Royal Bank of Canada owns:
About RBC Bank - Company

It's weird because you usually hear of American companies buying Canadian ones rather than the other way around.

[Big Mac]

We'll probably all be better off.

[Phileas]

Originally Posted by aristotles 

It's weird because you usually hear of American companies buying Canadian ones rather than the other way around.

Not for quite some time. Canadian banks have been shopping outside Canada for the last three years.

[nonhuman]

Royal Bank of Scotland owns a few too.

[Doofy]

Originally Posted by nonhuman 

Royal Bank of Scotland owns a few too.

And RBS is currently owned by the British taxpayer.
Bizarre.

[nonhuman]

Originally Posted by Doofy 

And RBS is currently owned by the British taxpayer.
Bizarre.

And they sponsor the Six Nations. Clearly this is all a ploy by the IRB to take over America and replace the NFL.

Excellent.

[Phileas]

That'll piss the Scots off.

Scotiabank (i.e. Bank of Nova Scotia) owns a huge chunk of South American banking too.

Canadian banking regulations are stricter than in the US, which is partly why they didn't get into the real estate sub-prime mess that many US banks did. Whether the stricter banking practices carry into their US banks remains to be seen.

[Athens]

Its not just the sub prime mess but overall, our banks don't dish out credit cards like condoms. You have to have a income to support it, and a good credit score to earn higher credit. Our banks also charge us more fee's and our retail sector contributes a higher percentage of fees back to the banks because Canada is mostly a plastic society IE Debit and Credit cards. So our banks make more money % wise and risk less money and what you end up with is a very strong banking sector.

[brassplayersrock²]

It's true! They are taking over, just the other day I got 4 Canadian Quarters in my quarter roll from a BoA and I'm in California!

[nonhuman]

Originally Posted by Athens 

Its not just the sub prime mess but overall, our banks don't dish out credit cards like condoms. You have to have a income to support it, and a good credit score to earn higher credit. Our banks also charge us more fee's and our retail sector contributes a higher percentage of fees back to the banks because Canada is mostly a plastic society IE Debit and Credit cards. So our banks make more money % wise and risk less money and what you end up with is a very strong banking sector.

That's the same problem really, a 'sub prime mortgage' just means a mortgage to a person who is below the optimal score for a mortgage. In the US we'll give credit to anyone, that's our problem.

[Athens]

Originally Posted by nonhuman 

That's the same problem really, a 'sub prime mortgage' just means a mortgage to a person who is below the optimal score for a mortgage. In the US we'll give credit to anyone, that's our problem.

That and it was setup to fail from the start. The mortgage started at a interest rate lower then prime as bait then after a year it jumped up to crazy high amounts which was impossible for people to pay. Everything about them was ugly.

[ShortcutToMoncton]

The whole "our regulations are stronger" argument doesn't wash if the Canadian banks in the US (TD for example has a far larger retail presence in the US than Canada) operate under US regulation/legislation. If they were more strict than everywhere else no one would use them....

[nonhuman]

Originally Posted by Athens 

That and it was setup to fail from the start. The mortgage started at a interest rate lower then prime as bait then after a year it jumped up to crazy high amounts which was impossible for people to pay. Everything about them was ugly.

Well, that's not entirely true. If borrowers had exercised a little thought and restraint they wouldn't have taken on such ridiculous mortgages even if they were offered. That's what we did; we bought a condo in Boston while all this was happening (and before it came crashing down) and were initially pre-qualified for a mortgage that was obviously, insanely too large for us to reasonably manage. So we simply used that pre-qualification to get a smaller, more reasonable mortgage on a home that we could actually afford.

Originally Posted by nonhuman 

Well, that's not entirely true. If borrowers had exercised a little thought and restraint they wouldn't have taken on such ridiculous mortgages even if they were offered. That's what we did; we bought a condo in Boston while all this was happening (and before it came crashing down) and were initially pre-qualified for a mortgage that was obviously, insanely too large for us to reasonably manage. So we simply used that pre-qualification to get a smaller, more reasonable mortgage on a home that we could actually afford.

It's not just the size of the mortgage, it was the rate that got the banks in trouble too. You can't blame borrowers for that. If your bank offered you 2% on your mortgage, would you say "no thank you, that's not very fiscally responsible of you, I'd rather pay 4.5%?"

[Athens]

Exactly and the devil was in the details a lot of people didn't know the rate would go from 2% to 18% after a year because those details got buried in the fine print. Yes I know that's no real excuse because people should read the fine print, but I don't pity the banks for the mistake they made given out loans to people knowing the rates would cause them to fail as well. There was enough blame for both the idiot consumer and the greedy banks.

@ShortcutToMoncton The majority of losses Canadian Banks did suffer during the peak of the recession was from the US operations, operating under US regulations. Scotia lost 700 Million and CIBC lost 2 Billion over the US problems. BMO, Royal, TD didn't really lose any money but had weaker profits. And I really don't know what your talking about with TD having a larger retail presence in the US. Either way it was stronger regulations, this is clear every annalist says the same thing so unless you can offer something more substantial then saying its a wash, I'm going to continue to believe it was the stronger regulations.

[ShortcutToMoncton]

Originally Posted by Athens 

@ShortcutToMoncton The majority of losses Canadian Banks did suffer during the peak of the recession was from the US operations, operating under US regulations. Scotia lost 700 Million and CIBC lost 2 Billion over the US problems. BMO, Royal, TD didn't really lose any money but had weaker profits. And I really don't know what your talking about with TD having a larger retail presence in the US. Either way it was stronger regulations, this is clear every annalist says the same thing so unless you can offer something more substantial then saying its a wash, I'm going to continue to believe it was the stronger regulations.

As far as I know, TD has more retail branches in the USA than Canada - something like 3000.

My point was regarding TD's US operations, which I would imagine are quite different than their Canadian operations. I would be very surprised if TD in America followed these supposedly stronger "Canadian regulatory standards". If they did, why would anyone use them when other American banks would far more easily give out credit?

(Having said that I don't have a clue how they actually operated.)

[Athens]

Guess we both have to do some research. I suspect even through TD operates in the US, it is still going to be subject to some Canadian regulatory standards unless its a completely separately owned operation. I'll dig around and see if I can back that. I can't see TD being that big in the US because its US operations operates on revenues in the millions not Billions. If it was as big as you claim it should be operating and profiting a lot more money then it is.

In Canada, the bank operates as TD Canada Trust and serves more than 11 million customers at over 1,100 branches. In the United States, the company operates as TD Bank (the initials are used officially for all U.S. operations). The U.S. subsidiary was created through the merger of TD Banknorth and Commerce Bank, and serves more than 6.5 million customers with a network of more than 1,250 branches in the eastern United States

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Toronto-Dominion_Bank

More branches, half as many customers.

Additionally its US operations from buying US banks started around 2005 and was completed for some of them in 2007 with more purchases in 2009. I don't think they have been operating long enough in the US to have been impacted regardless of US regulations or Canadian regulations. That's prob the best explanation why its US operations have not suffered like typical US banks.

[finboy]

Originally Posted by hayesk 

It's not just the size of the mortgage, it was the rate that got the banks in trouble too. You can't blame borrowers for that. If your bank offered you 2% on your mortgage, would you say "no thank you, that's not very fiscally responsible of you, I'd rather pay 4.5%?"

But borrowers should be able to ask "What happens when the teaser rate goes away? What will my payments be then?" They bear some responsibility too. But then they also bear a disproportionate share of the cost (moving, disrupting family life, hit to self-esteem, hit to kids' self-esteems, etc.)

Canadian banks are in better shape because they didn't have the temptation to go through the subprime crisis via Fannie, Freddie and the CRA. And because they didn't have the social engineers running their Congress (or whatever they call it).

[ShortcutToMoncton]

Originally Posted by Athens 

Guess we both have to do some research. .... If it was as big as you claim it should be operating and profiting a lot more money then it is.



Toronto-Dominion Bank - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

More branches, half as many customers.

Hang on - that's exactly what I said. I wasn't claiming TD's US operations were bigger than their Canadian operations. I just said that they have a larger retail presence.

My point about their operation under which regulations has nothing to do with the size of any bank's US presence. It was just a random comment.

greg

[Salty]

I actually opened my TD account during the recession. I remember being worried about storing my money with them and a teller pointed out that our laws actually prevented all of the issues that happened in America. We also have something up here where the government has enough insurance or something to pay for everyone's stored cash even if the banks did go belly up. Not totally sure if I got that right, but we had laws that even protected tax bank customers even if the bank itself was mismanaged.

[ghporter]

U.S. Savings accounts are insured by the federal government up to $250,000.00 since last July, when the limit was raised from $100,000.00. This is the purpose of the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation. Late last year the FDIC implemented Wall Street Reform Act rules, covering non-interest bearing accounts without a maximum value.

FDIC coverage has been in place since late in the Great Depression on savings accounts, but with all the "products" our creative financial scammers thinkers have come up with, it's hard to tell some times whether your account is a real savings account that is covered. T me, there is a distinct hint that those creative financial types actually thought about whether or not their "accounts" would be covered, allowing their customers to be cheated more thoroughly. Oops, I said that out loud, didn't I...

I don't know how the Canadian system works, but it sounds like it's less complex.

[Athens]

Canadian bank accounts are automatically insured by CIDC, a agency created in the 1960's. Part of the reason our banking fees are a little bit higher is because with every deposit a small fee gets collected for CIDC. All the major banks are apart of it and most smaller banks.

Part of the rules and regulations that help protect our system is with mortgages. Potential home owners need to pay a min deposit of 10 or 20% I think it went up to 20% and they can't borrow or use credit for that down payment. Banks have rules on credit worthiness requirements as well. As some one that got messed up credit early on in life I can vouch how protective the banks are at lending to less then real good credit. That said even with my bad credit Macy's approved me for a Credit Card in the US on the spot even though I didn't even live in the US a few years ago. I got it then never used it because it was a special promotion. Signing up for credit card gets you 20% off your purchase at signup, and add to that the 15% i was getting off already by showing my passport as a foreigner/visitor and the sales that week which was another additional 10-50% off I managed some pretty dam good savings. But it was rather funny how easy!!!! it was to get a credit card in the US.