John D. Hawke Jr., who regulates national banks as comptroller, conceded that his agency was aware of compliance problems at Riggs as early as 1997 but did not begin serious action against the bank until last year.
In an annual survey of the nation's largest banks, the Comptroller of the Currency said his agency was concerned about the rise of lending to borrowers with credit difficulties, as well as being worried about highly leveraged lending.
For a brief period in 2012, the subcommittee said, JPMorgan stopped providing profit and loss reports for the investment bank to the comptroller's office.
The nation's 14 largest banks reported that more than half of the loans they modified last year were delinquent again after just six months, according to the federal bank regulator, the comptroller of the currency.
The National Bank Act of 1863 provided for the federal charter and supervision of a system of banks known as national banks; they were to circulate a stable, uniform national currency secured by federal bonds deposited by each bank with the comptroller of the currency (often called the national banking administrator).
"We are dealing with a false perception that the O.C.C. doesn't understand community banks," said Jennifer Kelly, senior deputy comptroller for midsize bank supervision in the office.
John Lyons, senior deputy comptroller of bank supervision policy and chief national bank examiner at the Office of the Comptroller of the Currency, noted that the lack of refinancings of student debt may reflect "market inefficiencies," such as the lack of competition.
banks have vis à vis U.S. banks," said Eugene A. Ludwig, the comptroller of the currency under President Bill Clinton, who now runs the Promontory Financial Group, a Washington bank consultant group.
The comptroller accused the bank of violating the Bank Secrecy Act, a federal law that requires banks to rout out tainted cash by filing suspicious-activity reports.
He started out in 1972 as an assistant national bank examiner with the Comptroller of the Currency.
