Bank regulation has shifted fast over the last 18 months, and Ian Maloney, Chief Policy Officer at the American Fintech Council, joins Keith Daly on Travillian Next to break down what it means for bank compliance and risk teams. They get into why the prudential regulators are more coordinated, how reputation risk left the exam handbooks in favor of material financial risk, and the first CAMELS rating rewrite since 1996. Ian also lays out where AI governance, model risk, and fair lending stand for banks, how AI is reshaping fraud detection, and what the 2026 midterms could mean for bank supervision. A clear status check for anyone working in banking, fintech, compliance, or risk.

Steve Plunk was the OCC examiner at the center of the Penn Square Bank collapse, one of the most consequential bank failures in American history. He sits down with Travillian's Amber Buker to revisit the oil-fueled bank that fooled the biggest names in banking, the one line on the balance sheet that brought it down, and where that same blind spot is hiding in banks today.

A special conversation from the collaboration series between Travillian Next and Maxfield on Banks.

Brent Beardall, President and CEO of WaFd, Inc., joins Brian Love to tell the story of his rise from a bank file room to the CEO seat. Partway through, he gets surprised on camera by Simone Lagomarsino, the former CEO of Luther Burbank Savings, the bank WaFd acquired. The two cover leadership, the WaFd and Luther Burbank merger, surviving the 2023 banking crisis, and why banking is still a noble profession. A good listen for anyone thinking about leadership, succession, or M&A in community banking.

Travillian's bank & fintech recap from May 2026: Amber Buker, Chief Research Officer, and Brian Love, Head of Banking & Fintech Search, recap the month's biggest banking and fintech conferences (Finovate, D.A. Davidson, S&P Global, and Alloy Labs in Nashville). The honest, occasionally goofy conversation covers young bank executive talent, succession planning, stablecoin and tokenized deposits, AI in the boardroom, bank-fintech partnerships, and the Wild West of bank M&A ahead in H2 2026.

Take the Travillian Bank-Fintech Fault Line Diagnostic: https://travilliangroup.com/fault-line-diagnostic/

Reach Brian at [email protected] or Amber at [email protected].

Rhinebeck Bank President and CEO Matthew Smith joins Travillian Next for a candid conversation about leading a 160-year-old community bank into its next chapter. Six months into the role at the $1.3 billion publicly traded bank in Poughkeepsie, New York, Matt shares how he is thinking about balancing 1950s-style community service with 2026 technology, building a culture of diversity of thought, and setting the strategic direction for the next 3 to 5 years.

Matt brings a tech-forward background from Sterling, Webster, and the world of banking as a service into a traditional community bank, and the conversation is one other CEOs and boards should be paying attention to. It covers the opportunity cost of standing still, open architecture and the fast follower strategy, how Rhinebeck is competing against megabanks, fintechs, and big-box retailers all at once, and the talent profile community banks need to hire for now: experience design, enterprise architecture, payments innovation, data science, and AI fluency.

Matt also walks through Rhinebeck's second step conversion, what it unlocks for capital and M&A, and offers direct advice for aspiring community bank CEOs and the boards thinking about hiring them. Whether you lead a bank, sit on a board, or are building your career toward the C-suite, this is a practical conversation about the new wave of community banking leadership.

In this Part 2, on-location episode of Travillian Next, host Amber Buker (Chief Research Officer at Travillian) sits down with Heather Luck, EVP & Chief Financial Officer at Five Star Bank, for a candid, documentary-style conversation filmed inside the bank itself.

Heather opens up about the financial discipline behind one of the country's fastest-growing community banks. She walks through how Five Star manages its outsized CRE concentrations with granular monitoring, why cost of funds came down while reshaping the deposit base, and how the team sustains an efficiency ratio in the low 40s while investing heavily in people, technology, and new markets.

A must-listen for community bank CFOs, controllers, board members, and anyone curious about what it takes to run the financial engine of an opportunistic, high-performing community bank.

Filmed in collaboration with John Maxfield of Maxfield on Banks.

In this special, on-location episode of Travillian Next, host Amber Buker (Chief Research Officer at Travillian) sits down with Michael Rizzo, EVP & Chief Banking Officer at Five Star Bank, for a candid, documentary-style conversation filmed inside the bank itself.

Michael only half-jokingly calls Five Star "a sales organization masquerading as a bank," and that mindset runs through everything they unpack. He shares the origin story of how a single referral became a national mobile home park lending platform. He walks through Five Star's playbook for spotting opportunistic verticals, like the recent Orange County title-and-escrow build-out. And he opens up about what it takes to protect a flat, "never-quit" culture as the bank scales past 300 employees.

A must-listen for community bank executives, board members, and anyone curious about how a high-performing community bank actually operates.

Filmed in collaboration with John Maxfield of Maxfield on Banks.

Most banks want the casino loan. Few understand the full scope of what tribal banking actually looks like, and what it takes to do it right.

In this episode of Travillian Next, host Amber Buker, Chief Research Officer at Travillian, sits down with Mike Lettig, Senior Managing Director and Group Head of Native American Financial Services at Huntington Bank, and Jackson Brossy, Vice President of Native American Financial Services at Huntington Bank, for an in-depth conversation on Native American banking, tribal sovereignty, and the growing opportunity in Indian Country that most financial institutions are overlooking.

Mike and Jackson cover how Huntington built a fully integrated Native American Financial Services practice, why Indian Country is one of the safest places in the private sector to do business, and how tribal sovereignty works in practice when structuring deals, including a landmark unsecured credit facility completed entirely under Navajo law. Jackson also breaks down the $26 billion federal contracting sector, why tribes and Alaska Native corporations are uniquely positioned to access it, and why every financial institution should be paying attention.

Whether you are a banker exploring tribal markets for the first time or a financial professional looking to deepen your understanding of Indigenous economic development, this conversation is a must-listen.

What does it take to build a $9 billion community bank and stay independent doing it? Joe Dively, Chairman and CEO of First Mid Bank & Trust, breaks down the M&A strategy, leadership philosophy, and culture-first approach behind one of the Midwest's most extraordinary community banking stories — including a dividend streak dating back to 1879, eight acquisitions built on decade-long relationships, and a succession plan built around one of the youngest executive teams in the industry.

Scott Hildenbrand, Head of Depository Fixed Income at Piper Sandler, joins Travillian Next for a conversation on balance sheet strategy and the forces shaping banking in 2026.

In this episode, Travillian’s Brian Love and Andrew Liesch sit down with Hildenbrand to discuss what he’s hearing in bank boardrooms across the country. From the disconnect between bank earnings and valuations to execution strategies in a volatile interest rate environment, the conversation explores how financial institutions are thinking about balance sheet management, leadership decisions, and long-term growth.

The discussion also covers talent dynamics in the M&A landscape, the rise of niche banking strategies, and how regulatory expectations are influencing liquidity and capital decisions for banks today.

If you’re a bank CEO, board member, executive, or industry professional looking to better understand balance sheet strategy and the challenges facing community banks, this episode offers a candid perspective from one of the most active voices advising financial institutions today.