Following the Civil War, national banking charters were authorized by the National Banking Act, setting in place what we now call the dual banking system. Over the ensuing decades, the regulatory structure for banks was further shaped by financial crises, including the Great Depression; the creation of a national deposit insurance system; and other forces.
More recently, technological advances, along with the increasingly rapid evolution of financial products and markets, have driven many marketplace changes resulting in a dynamic business environment that creates both opportunities and significant challenges for banks and their regulators. The most visible change in the U.S. banking industry over the past quarter-century is the dramatic consolidation among banks.