Chevy Chase Bank, F.S.B. was the largest locally based

banking A bank is a financial institution that accepts deposits from the public and creates a demand deposit while simultaneously making loans. Lending activities can be directly performed by the bank or indirectly through capital markets. Because ...

company in the

Washington Metropolitan Area The Washington metropolitan area, also commonly referred to as the National Capital Region, is the metropolitan area centered on Washington, D.C. The metropolitan area includes all of Washington, D.C. and parts of the states of Maryland, Virgi ...

. It was acquired by

Capital One Capital One Financial Corporation is an American bank holding company specializing in credit cards, auto loans, banking, and savings accounts, headquartered in McLean, Virginia with operations primarily in the United States. It is on the li ...

in February 2009, and rebranded as

Capital One Bank Capital One Financial Corporation is an American bank holding company specializing in credit cards, auto loans, banking, and savings accounts, headquartered in McLean, Virginia with operations primarily in the United States. It is on the list ...

in September 2010. Despite its name, Chevy Chase Bank was a federally chartered thrift regulated by the

Office of Thrift Supervision The Office of Thrift Supervision (OTS) was a United States federal agency under the Department of the Treasury that chartered, supervised, and regulated all federally chartered and state-chartered savings banks and savings and loans associatio ...

, rather than a

bank A bank is a financial institution that accepts Deposit account, deposits from the public and creates a demand deposit while simultaneously making loans. Lending activities can be directly performed by the bank or indirectly through capital m ...

. It was formerly held and controlled by the B. F. Saul

Real Estate Investment Trust A real estate investment trust (REIT) is a company that owns, and in most cases operates, income-producing real estate. REITs own many types of commercial real estate, including office and apartment buildings, warehouses, hospitals, shopping cente ...

; B. Francis Saul II, who founded the REIT and is the grandson of the founder of the B. F. Saul Company, served as its chairman.

History

The bank traces its history to 1892, when Bernard Francis Saul founded the B.F. Saul Company, a mortgage and real estate firm. On October 11, 1955, a savings and loan charter was granted to a group of Baltimore area businessmen but never used. In 1969, the charter was purchased and the Chevy Chase Savings And Loan Association was established, taking the name from

Chevy Chase, Maryland Chevy Chase () is the name of both a town and an unincorporated census-designated place (Chevy Chase (CDP), Maryland) that straddle the northwest border of Washington, D.C. and Montgomery County, Maryland, United States. Several settlements in t ...

. Saul's grandson, B. Francis Saul II, opened the S&L on December 1, 1969, fifty years to the day after his grandfather, B. F. Saul opened Home Savings and Loan (subsequently merged into American Security Bank – now part of Bank of America). It became an

FDIC The Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation (FDIC) is one of two agencies that supply deposit insurance to depositors in American depository institutions, the other being the National Credit Union Administration, which regulates and insures credi ...

insured federal savings bank in 1985 and changed its name to Chevy Chase Savings Bank, F.S.B. accordingly the following year. It acquired the Standard Savings and Loan Association of

Grundy, Virginia Grundy is a town in Buchanan County, Virginia, Buchanan County, Virginia, United States, an area located within the Appalachian Mountains region. It is the county seat of Buchanan County. The town is home to the Appalachian School of Law. The popu ...

, in 1988. It adopted its most recent name in 1994, and on January 16, 1996, moved its registration from Chevy Chase to McLean.History of Chevy Chase Bank, F.S.B., Chevy Chase, Maryland (FDIC Cert: 32324)
, FDIC.gov It moved into its actual headquarters in Bethesda in 2001. In 1995, it acquired the historic Alex. Brown & Sons Building in

Baltimore, Maryland Baltimore ( , locally: or ) is the most populous city in the U.S. state of Maryland, fourth most populous city in the Mid-Atlantic, and the 30th most populous city in the United States with a population of 585,708 in 2020. Baltimore wa ...

, which was renovated the following year and used for a branch office. On December 4, 2008,

announced it would be acquiring Chevy Chase Bank. The acquisition was completed on February 27, 2009. On Friday, September 10, 2010, at 7pm, Chevy Chase Bank shed its name, opening its doors on Monday, September 13, 2010, as Capital One Bank.

Business structure

The bank's core business was residential

mortgages A mortgage loan or simply mortgage (), in civil law jurisdicions known also as a hypothec loan, is a loan used either by purchasers of real property to raise funds to buy real estate, or by existing property owners to raise funds for any ...

and consumer banking; its mortgage subsidiary, the B.F. Saul Mortgage Company, was one of the leading mortgage originators in the region. As of December 31, 2007, it held $14.0 billion in deposits. Chevy Chase Bank had more than 290 branches in

Delaware Delaware ( ) is a state in the Mid-Atlantic region of the United States, bordering Maryland to its south and west; Pennsylvania to its north; and New Jersey and the Atlantic Ocean to its east. The state takes its name from the adjacent ...

Maryland Maryland ( ) is a state in the Mid-Atlantic region of the United States. It shares borders with Virginia, West Virginia, and the District of Columbia to its south and west; Pennsylvania to its north; and Delaware and the Atlantic Ocean t ...

Virginia Virginia, officially the Commonwealth of Virginia, is a state in the Mid-Atlantic and Southeastern regions of the United States, between the Atlantic Coast and the Appalachian Mountains. The geography and climate of the Commonwealth are ...

, and the

District of Columbia ) , image_skyline = , image_caption = Clockwise from top left: the Washington Monument and Lincoln Memorial on the National Mall, United States Capitol, Logan Circle (Washington, D.C.), Logan Circle, Jefferson Memoria ...

, and claimed to have the largest network of ATMs in the Washington area. According to ABA routing information it was based in

Laurel, Maryland Laurel is a city in Maryland, United States, located midway between Washington and Baltimore on the banks of the Patuxent River. While the city limits are entirely in northern Prince George's County, outlying developments extend into Anne Arunde ...

, while the bank's

headquarters Headquarters (commonly referred to as HQ) denotes the location where most, if not all, of the important functions of an organization are coordinated. In the United States, the corporate headquarters represents the entity at the center or the to ...

offices were in downtown

Bethesda, Maryland Bethesda () is an unincorporated, census-designated place in southern Montgomery County, Maryland. It is located just northwest of Washington, D.C. It takes its name from a local church, the Bethesda Meeting House (1820, rebuilt 1849), which ...

, at the corner of Wisconsin Avenue and East-West Highway. According to its FDIC certificate, the firm was headquartered in

McLean, Virginia McLean ( ) is an unincorporated community and census-designated place (CDP) in Fairfax County in Northern Virginia. McLean is home to many diplomats, military, members of Congress, and high-ranking government officials partially due to its prox ...

. This was before being acquired by McLean based

, not after.

Competition

Its main competitors were the retail banking divisions of larger, supraregional companies such as

Bank of America The Bank of America Corporation (often abbreviated BofA or BoA) is an American multinational investment bank and financial services holding company headquartered at the Bank of America Corporate Center in Charlotte, North Carolina. The bank ...

BB&T BB&T Corporation (previously known as the Branch Banking and Trust Company) was one of the largest banking and financial services firms in the United States, based in Winston-Salem, North Carolina. In 2019, BB&T announced its intentions to merge ...

SunTrust Banks SunTrust Banks, Inc. was an American bank holding company with SunTrust Bank as its largest subsidiary and assets of US$199 billion as of March 31, 2018. The bank's most direct corporate parent was established in 1891 in Atlanta, where it was h ...

, and

Wachovia Wachovia was a diversified financial services company based in Charlotte, North Carolina. Before its acquisition by Wells Fargo and Company in 2008, Wachovia was the fourth-largest bank holding company in the United States, based on total asset ...

, and so emphasized its local nature and community involvement in its advertising. The bank used a

caricature A caricature is a rendered image showing the features of its subject in a simplified or exaggerated way through sketching, pencil strokes, or other artistic drawings (compare to: cartoon). Caricatures can be either insulting or complimentary, ...

portrayal of

Benjamin Franklin Benjamin Franklin ( April 17, 1790) was an American polymath who was active as a writer, scientist, inventor, statesman, diplomat, printer, publisher, and political philosopher. Encyclopædia Britannica, Wood, 2021 Among the leading int ...

as its advertising

mascot A mascot is any human, animal, or object thought to bring luck, or anything used to represent a group with a common public identity, such as a school, professional sports team, society, military unit, or brand name. Mascots are also used as ...

, who repeated the

tagline In entertainment, a tagline (alternatively spelled tag line) is a short text which serves to clarify a thought for, or is designed with a form of, dramatic effect. Many tagline slogans are reiterated phrases associated with an individual, s ...

''The Leading Local Bank'' in its

television commercial A television advertisement (also called a television commercial, TV commercial, commercial, spot, television spot, TV spot, advert, television advert, TV advert, television ad, TV ad or simply an ad) is a span of television programming produce ...

Litigation

Chevy Chase Bank was the subject of two national

class action A class action, also known as a class-action lawsuit, class suit, or representative action, is a type of lawsuit where one of the parties is a group of people who are represented collectively by a member or members of that group. The class actio ...

lawsuits for violations of the

Truth in Lending Act The Truth in Lending Act (TILA) of 1968 is a United States federal law designed to promote the informed use of consumer credit, by requiring disclosures about its terms and cost to standardize the manner in which costs associated with borrowing ...

of 1968 involving as many as 7,000 mortgage borrowers. A federal district court ruled against the bank in January 2007, but the ruling was stayed pending appeal to the U.S. 7th Circuit Court of Appeals. The Seventh Circuit Court of Appeals overturned the federal district ruling in September, 2008. The bank also agreed to pay $16 million to settle a class action alleging it charged late fees and high interest rates to

credit card A credit card is a payment card issued to users (cardholders) to enable the cardholder to pay a merchant for goods and services based on the cardholder's accrued debt (i.e., promise to the card issuer to pay them for the amounts plus the ...

holders, although it denied wrongdoing.

References

External links

Chevy Chase Bank website

{{Authority control Banks based in Maryland Companies based in Bethesda, Maryland Companies based in McLean, Virginia Privately held companies based in Maryland Banks established in 1955 Banks disestablished in 2010 Capital One 2009 mergers and acquisitions 1955 establishments in Maryland Defunct banks of the United States Defunct companies based in Maryland