Truist convened a discussion with Curinos on Thursday to review recent deposit trends across the US banking industry. Company and industry representatives framed current deposit dynamics as cautiously favorable for the year, while qualifying that optimism with several caveats.
On the call, retail and commercial banking executives described a guarded expectation that deposit levels will rise across the sector this year. They emphasized that year-to-date consumer deposit figures should be interpreted with care, since tax refunds have likely lifted balances temporarily. At the same time, participants highlighted ongoing inflationary pressure as a continuing headwind for household finances.
The tenor of the Curinos conversation echoed themes Truist presented at its conference two weeks ago, where banks themselves expressed fewer worries about deposit flight than some investor audiences. Executives reiterated that, despite higher investor anxiety, internal readings of deposit stability and growth remain relatively composed.
Curinos pointed to an important distributional detail underpinning the apparent improvement in consumer balances. The firm observed that the rise in average balances per account is driven exclusively by mid- and high-end consumers. Lower-end customers continue to face difficulties, and are not contributing to the positive balance trend.
Regional competitiveness in deposit markets emerged as a distinct focus. According to the discussion, the Southeast continues to be a fiercely contested region for deposits. Meanwhile, Texas is becoming noticeably more competitive, a shift that participants linked to recent merger activity among banks operating there. By contrast, California was characterized as the least competitive market at present.
Executives on the call therefore painted a picture in which headline deposit increases coexist with distributional inequality across customer segments and varying intensity of regional competition. They framed their optimism as cautious, stressing the influence of temporary factors like tax refunds and structural pressures such as inflation.
Impacted sectors: Retail banking, commercial banking, regional banking markets.