Benton, Washington Co. Branches Split Evenly

Between Jan. 1 and July 31, seven state-chartered banks had applied with the Arkansas State Bank Department for a total of 15 new offices in Benton and Washington counties. As of Aug. 8, all but one of those had been approved. Signature Bank of Arkansas applied for a Springdale branch on July 27 and it was expected to be approved.

Eight of those bank branches were in Benton County and seven in Washington County. Little Rock-based Bank of the Ozarks had the highest number of applications and approvals, requesting three Benton County locations and one in Washington County.

That number does not include national banks that are regulated with the Office of the Comptroller of the Currency and are not required to apply with the ASBD. So far this year, Legacy National Bank in Springdale has approval through the OCC to open two locations and Little Rock-based Metropolitan National Bank has conditional approval on its planned 12 locations in the two-county area.

In the same period, only one bank, First Western Bank of Booneville, applied for a branch in the Fort Smith area, and Arvest Bank-Fort Smith applied for a branch relocation.

Year-end numbers from the Federal Deposit Insurance Corp. are not yet available, but as of June 30, 2004, there were 149 bank offices competing for $5.17 billion in deposits in the two-county area.