Wal-Mart is planning to open bank in Utah

"This application is just another indication that Utah is becoming a global center for financial services," said UBA president Howard Headlee. "Wal-Mart is following the lead of other great companies like GE, Merrill Lynch, UBS, Goldman Sachs, American Express, GMAC, BMW, Volkswagen, Lehman Brothers, Target and many others who have already made significant investments in the Utah economy by establishing a Utah-based industrial bank."

Headlee called the industrial bank industry "the star performer in Utah's recent economic development success" because of the jobs and millions of dollars of investments they bring to the state's low-income communities.

"No matter how you look at this industry, it is good news for Utah," he said. And, he said, "industrial banks are subject to all the same laws, regulations and rigorous examinations as every other bank. The way this particular application is structured, there is no reason to expect any unfair competitive issues."

Scott Simpson, president of the Utah League of Credit Unions, said that "from a competitive perspective, we don't have much of a concern with industrial loan banks. Most, if not all, have very little brick-and-mortar in the state.

"Based on the application, (Wal-Mart Bank) will have very little impact on the way credit unions will live and operate."

Perhaps. But perhaps not, according to Ence.

"Trust, but verify," he said. "They have actually expressed the same thing (about Wal-Mart Bank's limited functions) to us, and we certainly hope they're being genuine when they're making these claims. But the fact of the matter is that even if they start out in a limited fashion, there's nothing to say they can't expand in the future."

For now, the ICBA says it will wait to see the bank's application.

"If it's an application for a very limited operation, we'd be hard-pressed to find grounds for objection," he said. "It's premature to say."

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