	u s bank income shows first drop in years problems in the farmbelt and oilpatch regions contributed to the first decline in overall income for u s banks in a quarter century the federal deposit insurance corp fdic said the nation s commercial banks had net income of billion dlrs in down slightly from s record billion dlrs the total was still the second highest ever reported but it was the first time income had not grown since the figures reflected a radical split in the health of banks in the two halves of the country the fdic said in the east one in banks had losses last year while one in four banks west of the mississippi river had losses nationwide one out of five banks reported losses the fdic said in the first of a new series of quarterly banking profiles it planned to issue i don t remember a time when there was such a clear distinction by geographic area fdic chairman william seidman told reporters he said that while the figures were not good they showed the problem did not lie with the banking system as a whole but with regional differences in economic performance some banks have failed so far this year twice as many as failed by this time a year ago but seidman said he doubted the pace would continue on a positive note banks increased capital to a record billion dlrs last year and there has been a slowing in the number of new problem banks in all regions except the southwest seidman said banks provision for losses from bad loans in the fourth quarter increased to billion dlrs a pct rise from a year ago large banks those with assets of one billion dlrs or more reporting fourth quarter losses totaled the fdic said seidman said it was too early to say what effect brazil s moratorium on debt interest payments would have on u s banks he said bank deregulation had given managers more freedom to run their banks and that an increase in failures was to be expected but this freedom from regulatory restraints also has meant other banks that were better managed have gotten stronger seidman said reuter 
