With online-only banks, you have to send deposits in the mail or through an ATM owned by another bank, which usually charges a fee, known as a surcharge. Some online-only banks absorb ATM surcharges, but that's a potential drain on profit margins. Odds are they won't. Online banking will grow rapidly for both banks and Internet-only banks. But that growth won't match the extraordinary wholesale shift to online trading that has taken place in the past two years.
Online banking faces too many hurdles.
Saving a few dollars on stamps, envelopes, and checks is a far less compelling reason to go online than saving hundreds of dollars on a stock trade. But the online banking wars will mean that many more PC-savvy consumers will have the option of never having to wait in line for a teller ever again. The McGraw-Hill Companies Inc. All rights reserved.