WASHINGTON–The House Financial Services Committee has released an overview on diversity inside the nation’s largest banks, finding both boards and senior management remain mostly white and male, and one analyst is predicting credit unions will also find themselves under the microscope.
The findings are based on responses provided by the banks themselves, including State Street, Citi, JPMorgan Chase, Bank of America, Wells Fargo, Morgan Stanley, BNY Mellon, and Goldman Sachs.
“There’s been a clear focus on diversity in the financial industry by Chairwoman (Maxine) Waters since she took the gavel, so this report is an attempt to put numbers around the issue,” said John McKechnie, a partner in the advocacy firm Total Spectrum. “Everything I hear on Capitol Hill points to an expansion of this kind of scrutiny, and credit unions may want to pre-emptively look at their own operations and honestly assess where they are, and where they should be.”
The Findings
According to data tabulated by the committee:
- 29% of board members at the biggest banks are female, while 17% are minorities.
- There are no female or minority CEOs at any of the banks in the survey.
- 24% of senior leadership at the banks is female, while 25% is minorities.
- None of the banks had a chief diversity officer who reported directly to the CEO.
- Four out of the eight megabanks spent more than $1 billion on diverse suppliers.