8 Studying banks with total assets less than $ billion, the researchers attempted to identify the differences between banks that they classified as “thriving” and those that they classified as “surviving.” Banks were identified as “thriving” if they maintained the highest supervisory rating, a composite CAMELS “1,” continuously from  8  See R. Alton Gilbert, Andrew P. Meyer, and James W. Fuchs (2013), “The Future of Community Banks: Lessons from the Banks that Thrived during the Recent Financial Crisis,” unpublished paper, Federal Reserve Bank of St. Louis, January.
This triple mandate was taken from earlier legislation, passed in 1945, that set the objectives for the central banking division of the Commonwealth Bank. It had its origins in a post-World War II Australia, when ensuring economic stability and high levels of employment were very much top of mind.