Thursday March 9, 06:29 AM Eastern time
Company Press Release
BNKU) National Discount Brokers and Bank United Announce Internet Discount Brokerage Partnership
NEW YORK & HOUSTON--(BUSINESS WIRE)--March 9, 2000--National Discount Brokers and Bank United have announced a strategic partnership that marks the expansion of NDB into the B2B sector and Bank United's expansion into providing online discount trading to its customers. National Discount Brokers Corporation/ndb.com is a leading Internet brokerage and financial services company and subsidiary of National Discount Brokers Group, Inc. (NYSE: NDB). Bank United (Nasdaq: BNKU) is the largest publicly-held depository institution headquartered in Texas. With this announcement, NDB.com will become the exclusive online broker at BankUnited.com.
"NDB is a leader in the online brokerage business thanks to our reputation for innovation," said Dennis Marino, Chairman of National Discount Brokers Corporation/ndb.com. "Today's agreement with Bank United marks the first partnership in our B2B strategy which focuses on providing our award-winning website and broad array of tools for online investors as a co-branded solution for financial institutions. We believe our B2B strategy will expand the scope of NDB.com's business while generating significant account growth at greatly reduced acquisition costs."
The NDB/Bank United alliance will give Bank United customers the ability to take care of their banking and investing needs at one location, whether on the Internet at BankUnited.com or in its branches. Bank United serves over 500,000 households across the state of Texas and operates a total of 153 branches, including 70 Seven-Day Banking Centers located in Kroger Supermarkets.
"NDB is recognized as one of the top online discount brokerage providers in the country," said Bank United Executive Vice President Ron Coben. "Bank United is one of the premier banking franchises in Texas. The partnership between these two firms will give Texans unparalleled access to their money at an amazingly low cost. Where else can a customer get more than 150 branches, half of which are open seven days a week, free checking, free online banking and the ability to trade securities for only 14.75 a trade It is a compelling value proposition that puts Bank United at the forefront of banks able to deliver full service banking through a bricks and clicks strategy."
Coben added, "Bank United is committed to serving customers the way they want to be served. You can bank in our branches, by phone, at our ATMs, or over the Internet. You can buy stocks and mutual funds from licensed representatives in our branches or you can click and trade at Internet speed."
The agreement also provides for a number of joint marketing activities. Advertising and hyperlinks to NDB.com will appear on BankUnited.com promoting NDB.com as the bank's exclusive online broker. The companies will also use direct marketing, print and broadcast to get the message out to Bank United customers and prospective customers.
The brokerage services of NDB will be made available to customers of Bank United commencing on July 31, 2000 or earlier.
About Bank United Corp.
Bank United Corp., headquartered in Houston, is the largest publicly traded depository institution headquartered in Texas, with 17.4 billion in assets, 8.4 billion in deposits, and 773 million in stockholders' equity. Through Bank United the company operates a 153 branch community banking network in Texas, including 79 in the Dallas/Fort Worth area, 64 in the greater Houston area, 5 in Midland, three in Austin and two in San Antonio is a national middle market commercial lender with 21 regional offices in 16 states operates 25 SBA lending offices in 16 states originates mortgage loans through 11 wholesale offices in 10 states and operates a national mortgage servicing business servicing approximately 340,000 customers. The Bank's website can be found at www.bankunited.com. Bank United is FDIC insured and an equal housing lender.
About National Discount Brokers Group
Headquartered in Jersey City, New Jersey, National Discount Brokers Group, Inc., an S&P Small Cap 600 Index company, is the parent company of two financial services entities: National Discount Brokers Corporation/ndb.com and Sherwood Securities. National Discount Brokers at November 30, 1999 had 178,400 customer accounts, with assets of 8.9 billion. It recently announced that during the first week of February 2000 NDB.com had reached 200,000 customer accounts. Sherwood Securities' main operations are as a market maker in approximately 4,500 Nasdaq and other OTC securities as of November 30, 1999. The Company has offices in Jersey City, New York, Los Angeles, Chicago, San Francisco, Denver and Boston. Customers can access National Discount Brokers Corporation/ndb.com at ndb.com, via the PowerBroker automated touch-tone telephone system 800-631-8884 or by calling 800-4-1-PRICE.
Securities products offered by NDB are not insured by the FDIC are not guaranteed by the FDIC are not deposits or other obligations of Bank United and are not guaranteed by Bank United and are subject to investment risk, including the possible loss of the principal invested.
Statements made in this press release constitute forward-looking statements, as that term is defined in the Private Securities Litigation Reform Act of 1995. These statements are subject to risks and uncertainties. These forward-looking statements generally are accompanied by words such as "intend", "anticipate", "believe", "estimate", "expect", "should" or similar expressions. It should be understood that these forward-looking statements are subject to a number of assumptions, risks and uncertainties, that could cause actual results to differ materially from those expressed or implied in the forward-looking statements. These uncertainties and risks include changes in laws, rules or regulations, customer growth at NDB.com, and the ability of software and hardware to be modified to perform the services required by the agreement. Risks also include unplanned expense increases, due among other things to unplanned expenditures for software, hardware and marketing alliances, and other risks as set forth in the Form 10-Q of National Discount Brokers Group, Inc. for the quarter ended November 30, 1999 and Form 10-K of Bank United Corp. for the year ended September 30, 1999.
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Contact:
National Discount Brokers
Public Relations
The MWW Group - Tel. 201/507-9500
Rich Tauberman (rtauberm@mww.com)
Matt Messinger (mmessing@mww.com)
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