BOSTON — The latest ATM deployer study, conducted by Dove Consulting, a division of Hitachi Consulting, and sponsored by CO-OP Financial Services along with the NYCE, PULSE and STAR ATM networks, has further documented a trend toward stratification in the ATM/EFT industry that industry observers had already said was occurring.

"It's a little bit obvious, in that it documented a trend we have been seeing for some time," said Jim Hanisch, senior vice president with CO-OP Financial Services, the cooperative owner of the CO-OP Network. "Where the last biannual report discussed and revealed an industry at a crossroads, this year's study showed a bit more of what is down each of those roads."

Hanisch noted that the study found the ATM/EFT industry broadly split between the independent service organization deployers that have generally put into place cash dispensing machines in retail locations and the financial institution deployers that have their ATMs generally in locations thought to be most convenient to their depositors.