1st Mariner Bank has been a strong supporter of the Network for Teaching Entrepreneurship (NFTE). NFTE’s mission is to ” provide entrepreneurship education programs to young people from low-income communities.” The goal is to encourage entrepreneurship, increase financial literacy, and provide participants a reason to stay in school and continue their education. The Baltimore NFTE office works with over 200 middle and high school students through teachers certified to teach the NFTE curriculum. Throughout the year, the students identify a business idea, build a business plan and, if possible, establish a business. They work with mentors from the private sector to refine their business plans and develop their businesses. To encourage these young entrepreneurs, there are numerous local and regional business plan competitions, where they compete against students from other schools for cash prizes.
William Mack and Ja'Mal Wills- J & W Sensations
For those who are good enough to win these local competitions, there is the opportunity to be nominated to compete in the national business plan competition in New York, for $10,000. Ten9Eight: Shoot for the Moon , from award-winning filmmaker Mary Mazzio, follows these students, from all around the country, as they prepare for and compete in this competition. I, along with my fellow employee Wade Barnes, was the mentor for two students from Patterson High School, William Mack and Ja’Mal Wills, who are featured in this film. Their company, J & W Sensations, produces an all natural skin lotion. The film was released nationally in November and will debut on BET this Sunday, February 7th at 12 noon. I encourage everyone to watch this incredibly powerful and moving story about these young entrepreneurs.
Here’s the good news – 2009 is over. Here’s some more good news – 2010 will be better for the economy. Here’s the bad news – 2011 might not be and that implies that 2010 could be a volatile year for stock prices, which appear to lead the economy by six months or so. Bottom line: you should be prepared for a roller coaster ride this year as investors experience mood swings in the face of rapidly shifting economic forecasts and a world replete with geo-political uncertainty.
One might be tempted to dismiss this gloomy chatter. After all, the gloom and doomers have been talking about foreclosures, weak bank balance sheets, high unemployment, etc., for months only to watch the market surge ahead, creating significant wealth for believers in the process. In other words, since March of last year, it hasn’t paid to be a contrarian. After a January/February 2009 market swoon that left markets tapping against lows not felt for a decade, U.S. equities presided over a massive rally that began on March 9th and lasted virtually through the balance of the year with almost no interruption and reduced volatility. The S&P 500 rose nearly 24 percent for the year, while the more heavily cyclical and economically sensitive tech-laden Nasdaq was up a whopping 44 percent.
Unless you’ve been completely cut off from all civilization you have read or heard about the devastating magnitude 7.0 earthquake that hit Haiti on Tuesday. The Red Cross has estimated that as many as 3 million people have been affected by the quake with a possibility of 100,000 deaths. This is a horrible disaster and our thoughts and prayers go out to anyone who has been affected by it.
Many around the bank have been asking how they can help. So, I decided to put together a short list of how and where you can donate:
The American Red Cross is probably the most well known organization currently helping Haiti. You can donate onlineor your cellphone by texting HAITI to 90999. The text will bill your cell phone $10 automatically.
Like the majority of Baltimoreans, we were really excited to see Baltimore’s huge win over New England this past Sunday. I am still a little hoarse from yelling at the tv screen. To make the victory even sweeter, I had a friendly wager with some New England fans: New England Clam Chowder for Maryland Crab Soup. Needless to say, we’ll be enjoying some “Chowdah” in the very near future.
So, as the city is bathed in purple lighting and the Ravens flags fly, we’ll be wearing our purple proudly on Friday. Good luck to our guys as they take on the team from Indianapolis, and most especially to Joe Flacco, Baltimore’s Quarterback, from Baltimore’s Bank. Go get ‘em Joe!
We are pretty proud of the response that we are seeing from the financial services (FI) community on our online marketing efforts. In 2009, we put a heavy emphasis on social media and clearly others have taken notice. Yesterday, Truebridge Financial Marketing, a consultancy based out of Boston, blogged about the most influential FI marketers of 2009.
These banks and credit unions are showing signs that they’re either moving in the direction of the new rules or in some cases, making it a top priority. But they’re clearly ahead of the curve in the financial industry.
On the list, 1st Mariner Bank… Saaaa-weet! That’s right, we are up there with other banking giants like BofA and Wells Fargo. I don’t know about you but it gives me a warm feeling to know that your local bank is providing the same - and more often than not, a better – level of customer service as institutions that are multiple times larger. The web has not only empowered you as a consumer, but it has also empowered the smaller institutions and created a level playing field.
Let us know what you think of our social media efforts by commenting below and be sure to check out the Truebridge blog post.
We have received a lot of questions from our customers, friends and associates lately on what will happen to housing prices in the new year. We could do research, however, any of our comments would be pure speculation. Instead, we would prefer to hear your thoughts and opinions.
Use the comment feature below to post your perspective. We are interested in what you have to say.
For those of you that know me, you know that I am a big fan of the TED talks. If you don’t know me and you’re not familiar with what TED is, I’ll explain… Um, or at least wikipedia will explain:
TED (Technology, Entertainment, Design) is an academic organization owned by The Sapling Foundation, a private nonprofit foundation. TED is well-known for its annual, invitation-only conference devoted to “ideas worth spreading” and for its lectures, known as TED Talks, which originally focused on technology, entertainment and design, but have now expanded in scope to a broad set of topics including science, arts, politics, education, culture, business, global issues, technology and development.
So, basically TED helps spread new ideas and concepts by having the large TED talks and then more localized TEDx events which, I might add, was recently here in Baltimore at MICA called TEDxMidAtlantic. Needless to say, these talks never cease to amaze me and provide a great resource to evaluate our world from alternative point-of-views. This brings me to the point of this post…
This past year has been rough…very rough, and quite frankly, I’m tired of all the negativity. Right now, with the year coming to a close, I’d rather examine what good will come from the lessons learned. How will consumers and society as a whole evolve from the “Great Recession?” Well, John Gerzema recently gave a TED talk on “The post-crisis consumer” which answers those very questions. Take a look and let me know what you think and what your thoughts are in the comments section.
So who else is tired of talking about 2009? I think we can all agree that this has been one of the most challenging years in recent memory. But before we leave this year and jump into 2010, let’s take a look at some of the things we learned along the way.
Property values don’t always increase- According to a recent article in the Baltimore Sun, the average sales price of a house in the Baltimore metro area in November was $260,000. This is a decline of 8% since last year and about equal to the average in 2004. In Maryland alone, almost 22% of homeowners owe more on their house than the property is worth. With the continuing softness in the economy, many experts feel that home values will not rebound significantly in 2010.
Saving is the new “consuming”- As credit card issuers and other lenders slashed available credit lines, cancelled credit cards, and raised interest rates, consumers realized how little they had to fall back on in an emergency. So consumers began saving at an accelerated rate and controlling their use of credit. It will be interesting to see if this trend continues into next year.
Consumers are taking greater control of their finances- Given all the above, the number one new years resolution in 2009 was managing their finances, eclipsing losing weight and stop smoking. There were numerous online tools available to help consumers organize and manage their whole financial life including bank accounts, credit cards, loans, and investment accounts. Web start ups like Mint, Geezeo, and Wesabe entered the market, while traditional players like Quicken Online and Yodlee continued their offerings. As bank customers look to their providers for help and advice, 2010 appears to be the year that many financial institutions will begin to offer these services as well.
So let’s say good bye to 2009 and welcome in a new year. Here’s hoping it is a little less “challenging” than the last!
Our “Set Your Savings” service, allowing customers to transfer money into a savings account every time they use their debit card, is receiving rave reviews from our customers. They can choose the amount per transaction, from $.05 to $1.00, and will receive a match at the end of 12 months. For more detailed information, go to our Set Your Savings page on the website and calculate your savings, or call us at 410-558-4200. Listen for our promotional spots on various radio stations beginning this week.
Are Americans maintaining their new focus on increasing savings while lowering debt? Some economists think we’ll keep increasing personal savings to a rate of about 8% of our after-tax personal income – consider that we haven’t seen a rate like that since the early 90’s (see graph below). However, in August, the personal savings rate fell for the third month in a row to 3% of disposable income as reported by the Commerce Department on October 1st.
U.S. Department of Commerce: Bureau of Economic Analysis: Personal Savings Rate Graph
Over the past several weeks there have been a large number of discussions and questions about the Savings Rate from both employees and customers which has prompted 1st Mariner Bank’s Treasury Department to do some additional research. They have recently completed a White Paper on Personal Savings with focus on the Savings Rate to explain how it’s calculated, what it means, what it predicts, and where it’s going. Below is a rough version that highlights some of the main points of the White Paper. Be sure to send us any comments, questions, or feedback by using the comment feature at the bottom of this post.
What influences the saving rate? Before looking at what influences the saving rate, it helps to understand what makes up personal saving. So, first, what is personal saving and how is the personal saving rate computed?
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