OVERLAND PARK, Kansas – Corporate Network Brokerage Services is no more. It still exists but it's been renamed simply CNBS to reflect its change in direction. At the start of 2003, CNBS was owned by 18 corporate credit unions. However this past summer CNBS, for the first-time ever opened up membership to natural person credit unions, and more significantly for the corporate network, it offered its corporate owners a chance to tender their ownership stake in the company. The reasoning behind the moves are indicative of the changes at CNBS, corporates, and even U.S. Central. Some large corporates have gone out on their own and started offering broker-dealer services, whether through a new CUSO or through U.S. Central's ISI subsidiary. By doing this, those corporates are essentially competing with CNBS, which is a broker/dealer. Of its 18 corporate owners, 10 of them did indeed sell their ownership stake, most citing that it wouldn't be appropriate for them to be competing with an entity they had an ownership stake in. Interestingly, of the eight corporates that remain as CNBS shareholders, four of them actually increased their ownership in the firm. These continuing owners of CNBS for now have no plans of offering their own broker/dealer services. Five natural person CUs became owners as a result of the offering. -

[email protected]