The story
Panics of 1893 and 1907 and the Great Depression: 1893–1933
Without deposit insurance, bank depositors took the risk that their bank could run out of cash due to losses on its loans or an unexpected surge in withdrawals, leaving them with few options to recover their money. The failure of one bank might shift losses and withdrawal demands to others and spread into a panic. During the Panics of 1893 and 1907, many banks filed bankruptcy due to bank runs. Both of the panics renewed discussion on deposit insurance. In 1893, William Jennings Bryan presented a bill to Congress proposing a national deposit insurance fund. No action was taken, as the legislature paid more attention to the agricultural depression at the time.
After 1907, eight states established deposit insurance funds. Due to the lax regulation of banks and the widespread inability of banks to branch, small, local unit banks—often with poor financial health—grew in numbers, especially in the western and southern states. In 1921, there were about 31,000 banks in the US. The Federal Reserve Act initially included a provision for nationwide deposit insurance, but it was removed from the bill by the House of Representatives. From 1893 to the FDIC's creation in 1933, 150 bills were submitted in Congress proposing deposit insurance.
The problem of bank instability was already apparent before the onset of the Great Depression. From 1921 to 1929, approximately 5,700 bank failures occurred, concentrated in rural areas. Nearly 10,000 failures occurred from 1929 to 1933, or more than one-third of all U.S. banks. A panic in February 1933 spread so rapidly that most state governments ordered the closure of all banks.
Establishment of the FDIC: 1933
President Franklin D. Roosevelt himself was dubious about insuring bank deposits, saying, "We do not wish to make the United States Government liable for the mistakes and errors of individual banks, and put a premium on unsound banking in the future." Bankers likewise opposed insurance, arguing that it would create a moral hazard for bankers and depositors, and even denounced it as socialist. Yet public support was overwhelmingly in favor. On June 16, 1933, Roosevelt signed the 1933 Banking Act into law, creating the FDIC. The initial plan set by Congress in 1934 was to insure deposits up to $2,500 ($60,168 today) and adoption of a more generous, long-term plan after six months. However, the latter plan was abandoned for an increase of the insurance limit to $5,000 (equivalent to $120,336 in 2025).
The 1933 Banking Act:
Established the FDIC as a temporary government corporation.
Gave the FDIC authority to provide deposit insurance to banks
Gave the FDIC the authority to regulate and supervise state non-member banks
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Funded the FDIC with loans in the form of stock contributions from the Treasury and the Federal Reserve Banks
Extended federal oversight to all commercial banks for the first time
Separated commercial and investment banking (Glass–Steagall Act)
Prohibited banks from paying interest on checking accounts
Allowed national banks to branch statewide, if allowed by state law.
The Banking Act of 1935 made the FDIC a permanent agency of the government and provided permanent deposit insurance maintained at the $5,000 level.
Historical insurance limits
The per-depositor insurance limit has increased over time to accommodate inflation.
1934: $2,500
1935: $5,000
1950: $10,000
1966: $15,000
1969: $20,000
1974: $40,000
1980: $100,000
2008: $250,000
Congress approved a temporary increase in the deposit insurance limit from $100,000 to $250,000, which was effective from October 3, 2008, through December 31, 2010. On May 20, 2009, the temporary increase was extended through December 31, 2013. The Dodd–Frank Wall Street Reform and Consumer Protection Act (P.L.111-203), which was signed into law on July 21, 2010, made the $250,000 insurance limit permanent, and extended the guarantee retroactively to January 1, 2008, meaning it covered uninsured deposits banks like IndyMac. In addition, the Federal Deposit Insurance Reform Act of 2005 (P.L.109-171) allows for the boards of the FDIC and the National Credit Union Administration (NCUA) to consider inflation and other factors every five years beginning in 2010 and, if warranted, to adjust the amounts under a specified formula.
FDIC-insured institutions are permitted to display a sign stating the terms of its insurance—that is, the per-depositor limit and the guarantee of the United States government. The FDIC describes this sign as a symbol of confidence for depositors. As part of a 1987 legislative enactment, Congress passed a measure stating "it is the sense of the Congress that it should reaffirm that deposits up to the statutorily prescribed amount in federally insured depository institutions are backed by the full faith and credit of the United States", and similar language is used in 12 U.S.C. § 1825(d), a 1989 amendment to the Federal Deposit Insurance Act.
S&L and bank crisis of the 1980s
Federal deposit insurance received its first large-scale test since the Great Depression in the late 1980s and early 1990s during the savings and loan crisis (which also affected commercial banks and savings banks).
The Federal Savings and Loan Insurance Corporation (FSLIC) had been created to insure deposits held by savings and loan institutions ("S&Ls", or "thrifts"). Because of a confluence of events, much of the S&L industry was insolvent, and many large banks were in trouble as well. FSLIC's reserves were insufficient to pay off the depositors of all of the failing thrifts, and fell into insolvency. FSLIC was abolished in August 1989 and replaced by the Resolution Trust Corporation (RTC). On December 31, 1995, the RTC was merged into the FDIC, and the FDIC became responsible for resolving failed thrifts. Supervision of thrifts became the responsibility of a new agency, the Office of Thrift Supervision (credit unions remained insured by the National Credit Union Administration). The primary legislative responses to the crisis were the Financial Institutions Reform, Recovery and Enforcement Act of 1989 (FIRREA), and the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation Improvement Act of 1991 (FDICIA). Federally chartered thrifts are now regulated by the Office of the Comptroller of the Currency (OCC), and state-chartered thrifts by the FDIC.
The final combined total for all direct and indirect losses of FSLIC and RTC resolutions was an estimated $152.9 billion. Of this total amount, U.S. taxpayer losses amounted to approximately $123.8 billion (81% of the total costs).
When the FDIC's Bank Insurance Fund was exhausted in 1990, it received authority from Congress to borrow through the Federal Financing Bank (FFB). Using this facility, the FDIC borrowed $15 billion to strengthen the fund, and repaid the debt by 1993.
2008 financial crisis
The FDIC faced its greatest challenge from the 2008 financial crisis. From 2008 to 2017 a total of 528 member institutions failed, with the annual number peaking at 157 in 2010. These included the largest failure to date, Washington Mutual, and the sixth largest, IndyMac. Wachovia, another large bank, avoided failure through last-minute merger arrangements at the FDIC's insistence. At the height of the crisis in late 2008, Treasury secretary Henry Paulson and Federal Reserve officials Ben Bernanke and Timothy Geithner proposed that the FDIC should guarantee debts across the US financial sector, including investment banks. Chairman Sheila Bair resisted, and after negotiations the FDIC instead announced a Temporary Liquidity Guarantee Program that guaranteed deposits and unsecured debt instruments used for day-to-day payments. To promote depositor confidence, Congress temporarily raised the insurance limit to $250,000.
Although most failures were resolved through merger or acquisition, the FDIC's insurance fund was exhausted by late 2009. The largest FDIC payout for that year was for the failure of Florida-based BankUnited FSB, which cost the fund $5.6 billion out of $17 billion at the start of the year. Rather than borrowing from the FFB or the Treasury, the FDIC demanded three years of advance premiums from its member institutions and operated the fund with a negative net balance.
The Dodd–Frank Act of 2010 created new authorities for the FDIC to address risks associated with systemically important financial institutions. These institutions were required to submit resolution plans, or "living wills," which the FDIC would execute in the event of their failure. A new division, the Office of Complex Financial Institutions, was created to administer these responsibilities. The act also made the insurance limit increase permanent and required the FDIC to submit a restoration plan whenever the insurance fund balance falls below 1.35% of insured deposits. The insurance fund returned to a positive balance at the start of 2011 and reached its required balance in 2018. That year also saw no bank failures for the first time since the crisis.
From Wikipedia’s article on Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation, shared under CC BY-SA 4.0.4