McLean's Capital One Moves into the Big Leagues of Banking

The Federal Reserve has approved Capital One Financial Corp.’s plans to acquire the online banking unit of the Dutch financial group ING. Tuesday's approval clears the way for the McLean-based credit-card lender to add about $80 billion in deposits, Bloomberg reported.

The Federal Reserve  said: On consummation of the proposal, Capital One would become the fifth largest depository organization in the United States by deposit size, with consolidated deposits of approximately $210 billion, representing approximately 2.3 percent of the total amount of deposits of insured depository institutions in the United States.

"Capital One would become the 20th largest depository organization in the United States by asset size, with total consolidated assets of approximately $292 billion," the Federal Reserve said.

The complete Federal Reserve report is attached to this story.

The Washington Post reported: "The decision comes nearly nine months after Capital One agreed to pay $6.2 billion in cash and $2.8 billion in stock to Dutch financial services firm ING Groep NV for the online bank.

"ING Direct comes with 7 million customers, $80 billion in deposits and $92 billion in assets, $41 billion of which are mortgage loans. Those additions would catapult McLean-based Capital One from being the eighth-largest U.S bank measured by deposits to the fifth, with an estimated $206 billion in deposits," The Post reported.

Because of the extensive public interest in the proposal, the Federal Reserve Board held public meetings in Washington, D.C., Chicago, Illinois, and San Francisco, California, where 225 people testified and more than 900 others submitted written statements, The Fed said.

Capital One is headquartered on Dolley Madison Blvd. Richard D. Fairbank, who founded Capital One Bank and serves as its Chairman and Chief Executive Officer, lives in McLean.