NEW S&L RULES REMAIN UNCLEAR

About 80 percent of the nation's 2,700 solvent thrifts, representing $1 trillion in assets, would fall short of new capital standards under one interpretation of the Savings and Loan bailout bill, regulators in the Office of Thrift Supervision said Wednesday. But under a more lenient reading of the law only 600 institutions with about $500 billion in assets would miss the standard and be subject to regulatory sanctions.

The key reform in the bill requires S&L owners to risk more of their own capital as a buffer between losses and government deposit insurance funds. However, S&L regulators said the law, cobbled together from House and Senate versions, left the standard ambiguous.