5-19 Journal

This morning with Dr. Kitenge we learned about data analytics. We started the class with
explaining why data analytics, especially, in excel is important. The excel file above is the concepts that
we were introduced to. We also learned what the limitations of data analytics are, what parts of excel
we need to be good at, and if we go to an interview to be able to explain how good we are in excel. We
also watched two videos about the important functions of excel. In addition, if someone sends us an
excel document, then we need to check to make sure it makes sense before we work on it.
This afternoon, I learned about bank operations from Professor Ford. During her lecture she
mentioned that banks are intermediaries. In fact, banks are truly the main source of loans. Without
banks, businesses would have a very hard time getting up off their feet because they would have no
means of obtaining loans. In order for the bank to get money, they must contact the reserve. In short,
the reserve will loan banks money for short periods of time. In other words, they would have enough to
be able to get them out of trouble. A correspondent bank is a large bank that can help smaller banks,
but for a cheaper fee. The bank has a board of directors which is a good idea since someone needs to be
in charge of both damage control and planning. Within the board of directors there are several
departments including the accounting and finance, audit and loan review, commercial or business
banking, compliance, consumer banking, credit, electronic banking, funds management, risk,
treasury/cash management, trust, and wealth management. De novo banks are defined as banks that
are 5 years old or younger and are under the supervision of the federal reserve. A company is
considered to be insolvent when liabilities exceed assets. I also learned that banks purposely make
interest rates to high for long-term loans so as to motivate people to pay it back. In other words, short
term loans have lower interest rates than long-term loans. The Net Operating Income (NOI) is not
considered to be a true representation of a bank’s performance. The key take away from this portion of
today’s class is that the NOI is something that should be taken lightly. In her lecture she gave us real life
examples. As part of her portion of the class, she would like for us to answer 4 questions over the
material she covered.