Cardinal Sanctuary

I dont like that at all. If Chase ever did that I would flip

Seriously though, I work as a bank marketing consultant, and this type of stuff has been coming ever since retail stores lobbied congress to try and get more revenue out of every debit/credit card swipe at their stores. Look up the "Durbin Amendment" and see how much the bottom line was affected for financial institutions because of their reduction in interchange income. Major retailers won big time (because they get a 2-3% boost and don't lower prices), and banks lost big time. With the fed funds rate being ridiculously low for a while now, margins on loans are wafer thin, so they had to make up those losses by pushing signature transactions with your debit card. Now that the interchange rate is reduced by more than half, they've lost that revenue stream too. True free checking is dying a slow death as a result, and stuff like this will begin to pop up as financial institutions look to get creative in order to make up for the lost revenue.

Bingo. This type of stuff harms the community banks and credit unions just as much, if not more than the big banks, because they don't have the savvy or desire to get creative in order to make up for that lost revenue. It wouldn't be surprising to me, and harmful to my company indirectly, if many of the smaller institutions get swallowed up by regional banks because they couldn't cut it any longer. They never took any bailouts, but they just can't operate a profitable business in some cases under the current model. You'll also likely see more internet only institutions created, who don't have the overhead of brick and mortar branches.