Regulator releases Trustco from upgrade agreement

PHOTOGRAPHER: Marc Schultz

The TrustCo Bank headquarters on Sarnowski Drive in Glenville.

GLENVILLE — TrustCo Bank has been released from a 2015 agreement with federal regulators that called for it to update some of its banking practices.

The agreement between the Glenville-based bank and the Office of the Comptroller of the Currency was put in place July 21, 2015, and terminated Feb. 7, 2018. Trustco reported the development Wednesday.

Trustco on Friday declined comment on its release from the OCC agreement, saying banks are prohibited from discussing details of regulatory reviews and enforcement actions.

In 2015, Trustco said in a news release that the agreement “calls for the bank to take various actions in areas such as compliance, corporate governance, audit, capital planning including dividends, and strategic planning, among others,” and said it followed a routine OCC examination.

“The comptroller has found unsafe or unsound banking practices, including those relating to compliance, governance, internal controls, audit, strategic and capital planning, and independent loan review and violations of consumer laws and regulations at the bank,” the agreement stated.

Trustco said the action plan to implement the agreement would cost it $2.5 million to $5 million.

Bank officials at the time said they were not proud of the report results, but added that Trustco was not the only institution to be called out in this way as regulators raised their expectations and required smaller banks to comply with regulations previously applicable only to larger institutions.

Without getting into specifics, CEO Robert J. McCormick in 2015 said the changes being required would make the bank stronger and give it standardized systems to accommodate future growth.

As the OCC was expanding its focus to smaller institutions, Trustco was steadily growing. A dozen years ago, it held $2.9 billion in assets and 82 branches in three states. Today it holds $4.9 billion in assets and operates 145 branches in five states.