WASHINGTON — Despite an announcement last week that the American Bankers Association and America's Community Bankers will merge, the two groups wrote a joint letter to Treasury advocating for separate bank and thrift regulators.

The groups commended Treasury for its work toward efficiency and wanted to work with the department in that direction. The letter read, “We are also eager to work with Treasury to modernize our financial regulatory structure. Successful enactment of a modern program of supervision for the housing government sponsored enterprises would be a good, concrete step in that effort.”

However, Treasury's June 27 announcement has stirred speculation of a merger of the regulators. While ABA and ACB said they appreciated that Treasury was going to approach the process “with an open mind” the groups still expressed their strong opposition to a merger of the regulators. “We believe any such plan would ultimately fail as it has in the past. We fear, however, that pursuit of such a plans could sidetrack more direct efforts that could improve our financial system,” ABA and ACB wrote.