East West Bank is considered a small bank compared to most of its competitors and thus cannot have the broad reach or impact of its larger competitors. For that reason, we choose to focus our CRA activities in areas that represent the most pressing needs of the communities we serve and that are in areas where we can make the most meaningful contribution.

General Focus – The Bank’s CRA philosophy is centered around three basic community reinvestment areas:  acceptable quality of life, small business lending and financial education.  The Bank is examined under the Interagency Large Institution CRA Procedures with the lending test weighted more heavily than the others.  

CRA Services Focus

Acceptable quality of life, Small Business Credit, Financial Education

As an institutional philosophy, the primary objective of the Bank’s community service strategy is to “enable” low- and moderate-income individuals and the communities in which they live to grow into sustainable, desirable, more culturally integrated, and more comfortably managed lifestyles and environments.

“Enabling” is a very purposeful and very specifically defined objective at the Bank.  It means that we seek first and foremost to help people and communities in need to help themselves.  We believe steadfastly that this approach, far more than traditionally accepted monetary giving alone, will help create positive and desirable change that is, above all else, sustainable. 

The overall CRA service goal will be to assist low- and moderate-income individuals, and continually assess the credit needs of the Bank’s local communities. As part of the Bank’s ongoing community development efforts, EWB provides the community with easy access, convenient banking services through multi-lingual services (e.g., English, Spanish, and Chinese) which are offered through multiple channels such as ATM, online banking and 24-hour phone banking. We also offer extended banking hours and 7 days / week banking services with our in-store branches. In support of our objective to
“enable” LMI individuals, products such as Free Checking, low-fee remittances, low-doc and no-doc mortgage, and secured credit card programs were developed to meet the needs of the Bank’s local communities.    

In addition to our basic focus of offering superior customer service, assuring accessibility of branches and ATMs, and continuing to offer affordable remittance services, we continue to strive to participate in qualified community service activities, such as:

• participating on Advisory Boards
• participating on committee(s) (i.e., Credit Committee; fund raising, loan review, etc.)
• providing technical assistance on financial matters to small businesses or community development organizations; and
• providing education or training for financial access (e.g., home ownership counseling, financial planning, small business lending).