Republic Bancorp, embroiled in a fight with regulators over refund loans, plans to stay in the tax business no matter the outcome, according to CEO Steve Trager. Trager made the comments at a presentation at InvestKY, an equity investment conference held earlier this month.
Slides outliningTrager's presentation were made posted on the SEC site, but a webcast of his exact remarks was not available on InvestKY's website. However, he was quoted by publications covering the event as stating that the bank would stay in the tax business even if it lost its battle with the Federal Deposit Insurance Corp.
The FDIC is seeking a $2 million civil monetary penalty from the company and to halt its offering refund anticipation loans. The FDIC claims that after the Internal Revenue Service decided not to provide the direct deposit indicator Republic's decision to provide RALs anyway constituted unsafe banking practices. Republic, which is appealing the decision, said that it had tightened its underwriting criteria and had substantially reduced loan losses despite the lack of the indicator.
Republic is claiming harassment by the FDIC and filed a lawsuit in March challenging the agency.
Bob Scott has provided information to the tax and accounting community since 1991, first as technology editor of Accounting Today, and from 1997 through 2009 as editor of its sister publication, Accounting Technology. He is known throughout the industry for his depth of knowledge and for his high journalistic standards. Scott has made frequent appearances as a speaker, moderator and panelist and events serving tax and accounting professionals. He has a strong background in computer journalism as an editor with two former trade publications, Computer+Software News and MIS Week and spent several years with weekly and daily newspapers in Morris County New Jersey prior to that. A graduate of Indiana University with a degree in journalism, Bob is a native of Madison, Ind
