Wal-Mart Again Seeks Entry Into Banking

Wal-Mart Stores Inc. is again trying to get into the banking business, after being stymied in two previous attempts since 1999.

And already anticipating the reaction of other financial companies, Wal-Mart insisted Tuesday that it didn’t want to do for banking what it did for retailing.

“I think there’s a fear out there that Wal-Mart is going to open branch banks. We are not,” said Sharon Weber, a spokeswoman at the company’s headquarters in Bentonville, Ark.

Rather, the world’s largest retailer said it wanted to operate a bank to process its own debit, credit and electronic check transactions. The company now uses third-party vendors to process some 140 million such transactions each month, paying a small fee each time, Weber said. Wal-Mart wants to reduce those processing costs.

“That’s going to be a tremendous savings that we can pass on to our customers,” Weber said.

Wal-Mart has applied to open a so-called industrial bank in Salt Lake City. The state-chartered bank wouldn’t open branches or lend money, and it would accept deposits only from charities and nonprofit groups, according to the company.

Utah regulators, who said it normally takes about 120 days for applications to be approved or denied, said industrial banks had the option of operating like any other full-service bank, or could choose to concentrate on a niche business, such as the back-office processing that Wal-Mart said it would pursue.

Still, other bankers are worried by the idea that Wal-Mart might at some point expand its financial institution into an all-purpose bank peddling certificates of deposit alongside underwear.

“Over time, we are concerned that Wal-Mart could change their business plan and decide to enter retail banking,” said Karen Thomas, executive vice president for government relations at the Independent Community Bankers of America in Washington. “Our association has a long-standing opposition to mixing banking and commerce.”

Wal-Mart wouldn’t be the first retailer to do so: Nordstrom Inc., for example, already operates a consumer bank that takes deposits and makes home loans.

Normally, however, industrial banks in Utah aren’t allowed to expand outside of their initial parameters within the first three years of operation unless they get state approval, said Darryle Rude, supervisor of industrial banks at the Utah Department of Financial Institutions.

Wal-Mart tried to buy an Oklahoma bank in 1999 but was blocked by changes in federal banking laws. The company’s attempt to buy a small California bank in 2002 was blocked by state law changes.

Since then, the retailer has struck deals with dozens of community banks and credit unions that now operate more than 1,000 independent bank branches in Wal-Mart stores, Weber said. She said the company didn’t plan to compete with its bank partners or to break the long-term leases that allow them in the stores.

“The important thing is that we are hoping to have an industrial bank, without creating a threat to anyone,” Weber said.

Community bankers still are wary.

“We are going to be watching what they do very carefully,” Thomas said. “The industrial loan company that they are chartering is the last remaining loophole that allows commercial firms to own a bank.”