According to a consumer sentiment poll released this week but University of Michigan, concern over the fallout from late-summer hurricanes caused U.S. consumer sentiment to dip in September, though Americans remain generally fairly optimistic about the direction of the economy. (Bloomberg)

Today’s retail experience calls for a special blend of traditional businessand innovative interaction, and for banks, that means getting customers in the lobby but giving them a fresh experience. (ABA Banking Journal)

The Federal Financial Institutions Examination Council has released the 2016 Home Mortgage Disclosure Act data on mortgage lending transactions at 6,762 financial institutions. The data encompasses 13.1 million mortgage applications, 8.4 million of which resulted in loan originations — a 13 percent increase from 2015; refinance originations rose by 16 percent. (ABA Banking Journal)

The initial blueprint for President Trump's tax plan omits many critical details and numbers that congressional tax writers will now have to decide on as they draft legislation. Overall, however, it hints at Drastically lower rates for businesses, fewer income tax rates for individuals,repeal of the estate tax and a much larger standard deduction and child tax credit. (CNN Money)

For a growing share of bank customers—especially millennials and their successors, Generation Z, mobile banking is where they will engage with their customers most frequently. According to Federal Reserve figures, 43 percent of bank customers use mobile banking, including 67 percent of millennials. According to a TD Bank survey, mobile is the fastest-growing channel for bank customers. (ABA Banking Journal)

Upon its introduction, Occulus Rift Virtual Reality may have looked like a technological innovation for a very narrow group of users in 2014, but it's turning out to be an experience that is relevant to a much larger and more general group: consumers. (PYMNTS.com)

Sens. Claire McCaskill (D-Mo.) and David Perdue (R-Ga.) released a bill this week, meant to reduce regulations on some banks. Applauded by ABA, their bill would designate banks that have more than $50 billion in assets but are focused on regional business and don't pose a global financial risk in the event of their collapse as exempt from stricter federal oversight. (The Hill)

The OCC has conducted a study finding that the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau’s arbitration rule is likely to increase the cost of credit by about 25 percent once lenders factor in the cost of class action litigation. (ABA Banking Journal)

Measuring inflation isn’t a simple task, but it is an incredibly important one. Inflation determines Social Security benefits and pay increases, and mismeasurement has real-world consequences. (Bloomberg View)

With banks engaged in advanced technological innovation and fintech firms pursuing a wide variety of strategic paths, ABA President and CEO Rob Nichols laid out his views on competition in the financial industry in a speech at a fintech conference hosted by the Federal Reserve Bank of Philadelphia this week. (ABA Banking Journal)

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