Dallas Fed Senior Vice President Bob Hankins, who oversees bank regulation in the Eleventh District, discusses the district’s banks—from the risks posed by today’s faltering housing markets to lessons from the turbulence of the 1980s.

Commercial banks in the Eleventh Federal Reserve District reduced their losses substantially in 1989 but still collectively reported a loss for the year. The improvement primarily resulted from increases in fee income. In addition, Eleventh District banks reduced their nonperforming loans and...

The Texas Industrial Production Index (TIPI) measures the output of the manufacturing, mining, and utility sectors of the Texas economy. These sectors are of special interest because of their sensitivity to business cycles and because of the size (albeit declining) of the Texas mining sector....

Many observers view economic diversification as the antidote for the Southwest’s boom-and-bust cycles and as the key to long-term economic growth. Robert W. Gilmer addresses this issue by analyzing whether regional growth has been dominated by industry-specific cyclical factors or whether...