ING Future in DE Uncertain After Capital One Takeover

When Capital One Financial Corp. announced it was acquiring Wilmington-based ING Direct USA last month, the CEO of ING’s Dutch parent said: “I am very pleased that we have found in Capital One a good home for our customers and employees.”

It’s unclear exactly what the future will hold for ING’s 1,200-plus Delaware employees or its operations here, but financial analysts and Capital One’s past acquisition history all point to possible changes at the pioneering online bank that opened its doors in the First State in 2000.

Capital One said it expects a savings of $90 million to come out of the purchase of ING and that’s got to come from somewhere.

The firm pointed to a host of targets in a statement released when the merger was announced, including “consolidating systems, platforms and corporate staff functions. In addition to these cost synergies, Capital One expects to achieve funding savings of $200 million annually from optimizing management of the combined deposit portfolio. Beyond these amounts, there are potential additional synergies from cross-selling the [ING] ShareBuilder online brokerage products to Capital One customers and select Capital One products to ING Direct customers, and from balance sheet repositioning opportunities.”

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