The Federal Deposit Insurance Corp. (FDIC) will provide financial institutions additional time to account for a new rule governing imagery and text representing the agency. The compliance date for certain provisions of the rule is being pushed back from Jan. 1, 2025, to May 1, 2025.
The extension applies only to the section of the final rule intended to modernize requirements governing use of the official FDIC signs and advertising statements – Part 328, subpart A. The compliance date for the portion of the rule related to misrepresentations of deposit insurance coverage, subpart B of Part 328, will remain Jan. 1, 2025.
The FDIC approved the final rule, “FDIC Official Signs and Advertising Requirements, False Advertising, Misrepresentation of Insured Status, and Misuse of the FDIC’s Name or Logo,” in December 2023 to address issues involving institutions not insured by the agency displaying the FDIC logo and advertising statement giving the opposite impression.
Feedback received from banks and other banking industry participants helped the FDIC understand that some institutions would benefit from additional time to implement the new regulatory requirements under subpart A. The extension applies to the provisions requiring the use of the FDIC official sign, official digital sign, and other signs differentiating deposits and non-deposit products across all banking channels, including physical premises, ATMs and digital channels, and the establishment and maintenance of written policies and procedures to achieve compliance with Part 328.
Since the 1930s, banks have displayed the black and gold FDIC official sign at branch teller windows to give customers confidence about the safety of their deposited funds. With the variety of options available to modern-day depositors online, the agency seeks to ensure only entities that truly provide this level of certainty and confidence are able to display the official FDIC sign on digital channels, such as bank websites and mobile applications, through which depositors are increasingly handling their banking needs.