Awards for Excellence 2020
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As the sixth-largest bank in North America by branches, TD Bank Group penetrates deep into the Canadian and US markets. It deployed massive support to retail and corporate clients in both countries as the coronavirus crisis took hold.
As of April 30, 2020, the bank had implemented real estate loan deferrals for 126,000 accounts in Canada and 7,000 in the US, worth C$36 billion ($26.5 billion) and $2.5 billion respectively.
Other consumer lending deferrals helped 122,000 accounts in Canada and 226,000 in the US. Some 17,000 small business and commercial banking clients in both countries also received support.
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Bharat Masrani, |
The bank was an important participant in the two big government stimulus programmes for Canadian and US small businesses. In the Canada Emergency Business Account programme, the bank had provided some 140,000 loans worth C$5.7 billion by May 18.
In the US Paycheck Protection Program, it had funded 75,000 loans worth $8.2 billion. It targeted the very smallest first. As of the end of April, more than 80% of PPP loans through TD Bank had been to companies with fewer than 25 employees.
The common thread running through all the most effective crisis responses this year has been work done to support local communities. Banks, with their constant sight of day-to-day cash flows of small businesses around a country, often grasped the critical importance of such companies to the overall economy before national or even local authorities.
“For more than 165 years, we have built our bank with purpose and dedication, with a focus on enriching the lives of our customers, colleagues and communities,” said chief executive Bharat Masrani, when reporting second-quarter earnings on May 28. “That purpose guides us as we take the steps needed to support and protect the economy and those we serve.”
TD’s response reflected that recognition. The bank quickly created the TD Community Resilience Initiative, a programme of funding, engagement and collaboration with all sorts of community groups, under the umbrella of the bank’s existing corporate citizenship platform, the TD Ready Commitment. The new initiative has committed C$25 million in support for community resilience.
It donated C$1 million to the Frontline Fund, which provides healthcare workers in Canada with supplies and research funding. TD Securities’ Underwriting Hope Fund, an employee-led charity, raised over C$1.3 million in an annual campaign event that was diverted to focus on the Covid-19 crisis. Some 1,300 staff took part.
With so much focus on humanitarian measures, it is often taken for granted that banks are also helping in the functioning of markets. But some are asked to step up in particularly important ways. When Bank of Canada needed help with its commercial paper purchase programme and its C$10 billion corporate bond-buying programme, it was TD Asset Management that it chose to run those initiatives.
