I hadn't looked at it that way but that does make more sense EI.
ABNK isn't the only one. Perhaps bankings' BoD's in general cannot resist the pre-recession business model of paying dividends. Old model's die hard.
Bank dividends peaked between mid-2007 and mid-2008, just months before the financial crisis boiled over with Lehman Brothers Inc's Chapter 11 bankruptcy filing in September 2008.