President's Message

By now all of you should have received the Bank’s annual reports. I urge you to take the time to read the two reports. Since FHLB Des Moines is a cooperative, you have a stake in what FHLB Des Moines does and these reports provide information about the Bank’s performance in 2007. We publish two reports each year – one that focuses on the Bank’s financial overview and how members are benefiting from the Bank and one that concentrates on the Bank’s Affordable Housing Advisory Council and our community investment programs. For a detailed financial report you can access the Bank’s 10-K at www.fhlbdm.com or www.sec.gov .

The subprime fallout and the resulting Fed cuts and capital markets disruptions have created challenges for both sides of the balance sheet and highlighted the need for member institutions to revisit their liquidity plans. We look forward to helping you, whether it’s discussing ways to increase your available collateral or recommending more cost-effective borrowing structures. During this time of market uncertainty, we want to work together, as your partner, making sure you have the funding you need for your communities.

The Bank’s advance levels continue to grow. We attribute this in part to our very competitive advance rates as compared with brokered deposits. When you compare our advance rates and those of brokered deposits you may not get accurate results unless you are taking into consideration that funding quotes can differ based on interest accruals and interest payment frequencies. In order to make an apples-to-apples comparison, quotes from different funding sources need to be converted to the same day count and interest payment frequency.

FHLB Des Moines recently completed this type of analysis where we compared our advance rates to brokered deposit rates. This comparison shows that our rates are very competitive - even without factoring in the yield you receive on your FHLB Des Moines stock. Our advance rates with terms of three months to five years were as much as 90 basis points less than brokered deposits. Click here for the latest comparison.