Short Takes: Bank Insurance Group Unimpressed with Deal

Though they no longer oppose the reform bill backed by the American Bankers Association, insurance agents have not necessarily made peace with banks, says an official of a bank insurance group.

"It will take about a year to really determine" whether the Independent Insurance Agents of America and its members will stop seeing banks as the enemy, said Kathleen Collins, counsel for the Financial Institutions Insurance Association.

The agents group dropped its opposition to the bill after negotiations on a handful of bank-insurance issues with the ABA.

But Ms. Collins' group, which represents many banks in the insurance business, still opposes the bill.

"That deal doesn't change our positions," Ms. Collins said.

Her group said in a press release that the bill "fails to adequately protect the ability of banks and other financial institutions to sell insurance free from the restrictions of discriminatory state laws."

The bill would replace "the certainty of the Supreme Court's unanimous decision in the Barnett case with a game of litigation roulette," the group said.