FDIC 2026 Priorities: What Banks Need to Know

What Changed at the FDIC Between 2025 and 2026

The agency began 2025 with a comprehensive review of its regulations, guidance and supervisory manuals, and in March 2025 it withdrew the 2024 proposal that would have tightened brokered deposit restrictions.

Many of the proposals issued during 2025 became final rules in 2026, so the changes banks were told to expect are now largely in force. Several were adopted jointly with the OCC and the Federal Reserve, which extends their reach beyond the state non-member banks the FDIC supervises directly.

Supervision Refocused on Material Financial Risk

The most consequential change for examinations is the definition of an unsafe or unsound practice. The OCC and FDIC adopted a final rule on August 27, 2026, effective November 2, 2026, that defines the term as conduct contrary to generally accepted standards of prudent operation that, if continued, would likely cause material harm to the institution’s financial condition or create a material risk of loss to the Deposit Insurance Fund.

Matters requiring attention (MRAs) are limited to practices that could reasonably be expected to cause that harm, or to actual violations of banking law. Both agencies committed to issuing MRAs for legal violations only when those violations are substantive.

Three further changes shape the examination experience:

Reputation risk removed

On April 7, 2026, the OCC and FDIC issued a final rule barring the agencies from using reputation risk as a basis for supervisory action or from pressuring banks to drop customers over lawful political, religious or business activity.

Continuous examination threshold raised

The asset threshold for continuous examination programs moved from $10 billion to $30 billion.

Simpler appeals

Supervisory appeals and extension requests for community bank consumer compliance examinations were streamlined.

Capital and Threshold Relief for Community Banks

Capital and reporting changes concentrate on smaller institutions. On April 23, 2026, the federal banking agencies finalized a reduction in the community bank leverage ratio (CBLR) from 9% to 8%, effective July 1, 2026, and extended the grace period for a bank that temporarily falls below the ratio from two quarters to four.

The FDIC also approved a final rule on November 25, 2025, effective January 1, 2026, that raises several regulatory thresholds to reflect inflation and indexes them going forward. Under Part 363, the general audit and reporting threshold rose from $500 million to $1 billion, and the internal control over financial reporting attestation threshold rose from $1 billion to $5 billion.

For the largest banks, the agencies finalized changes to the enhanced supplementary leverage ratio for global systemically important bank holding companies and their depository subsidiaries in November 2025, completing the proposal issued in June 2025.

Digital Assets, Resolution Planning and Third Parties

In March 2025, the FDIC confirmed that supervised banks may engage in permissible crypto-related activities without prior notification. Banks remain responsible for managing the associated market, liquidity, operational, cybersecurity and compliance risks.

The GENIUS Act has since given payment stablecoins a statutory framework. On April 7, 2026, the FDIC proposed rules for permitted payment stablecoin issuers that are subsidiaries of FDIC-supervised banks, including one-to-one reserve backing, a $5 million minimum capital level during a three-year de novo period, redemption within two business days and a ban on paying yield to holders.

Reserves would receive deposit insurance coverage for the issuer only, not pass-through coverage for individual holders.

A June 25, 2026 proposal would remove insured depository institutions with $50 billion to $100 billion in assets from the requirement entirely, move institutions above $100 billion from a two-year to a three-year filing cycle, and eliminate more than half of the rule’s content requirements.

On September 11, 2026, the agencies proposed revised third-party risk management guidance that scales oversight to the risk each relationship presents, with comments due November 16, 2026.

Key FDIC Rule Changes at a Glance

The table below tracks the status of each change covered above as of September 2026.

Each final rule has to reach the policies, controls and training that depend on it. Under the new MRA standard, examiners assess materiality on objective facts scaled to an institution’s size and complexity, so a documented risk assessment with its rationale carries weight in an examination.

The Federal Register remains the authoritative source for final text as regulatory change in 2026 continues.

Frequently Asked Questions

With three proposals still awaiting final rules, the useful next step is to assign an owner to each one and review the list when the Federal Register publishes final text.