Bank of America Plans 19 Wisconsin Financial Centers by 2030 as It Works Through $1.2 Billion Treasury Fine

Bank of America said Wednesday, Oct. 28, that it will open 19 financial centers across Wisconsin through 2030, creating about 130 jobs. It then plans to enter Alabama and the Greater New Orleans area in 2027.

The first two Wisconsin centers opened this month in Madison and Milwaukee, according to the bank.

The expansion plan

The bank plans to open 10 centers across Birmingham and Huntsville, Alabama, beginning in the first quarter of 2027. Eight more are planned in Greater New Orleans starting in the second half of 2027.

Bank of America operates roughly 3,500 financial centers nationwide, covering about 83% of the U.S. population. It says it has opened roughly 200 new centers in 17 expansion markets since 2014 and aims for about 50 new centers a year across its network.

Since 2016, the bank says it has invested more than $5 billion in new locations and upgrades to existing ones.

Holly O'Neill, president of consumer, retail and preferred banking, said the bank picks markets "based on their growth dynamics, their population, and our opportunity to grow the business."

CEO Brian Moynihan said clients increasingly bank digitally, but "when they're buying a home, starting a business or planning for retirement, they want to sit down with someone they trust."

The Wisconsin push builds on a presence that already includes Merrill, Business Banking and Global Corporate Banking, said Drew Slocum, president of Bank of America Wisconsin.

A bet on physical branches is a notable one at a time when much of the industry talks mainly about apps. Real jobs and real storefronts in new states are hard to argue with, and the bank is putting its own money behind the strategy.

The Treasury fine

The expansion comes alongside a much less flattering story. The Treasury Department announced a fine of more than $1.2 billion against Bank of America for violating anti-money laundering and sanctions laws.

Treasury said the bank, the second-largest in the country, failed to mitigate and report "priority national security risks, including Chinese Money Laundering Networks and illicit finance along the southwest border."

Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent said in a statement: "When a bank of this size fails to meet its anti-money laundering and sanctions obligations, the consequences extend far beyond its own walls, exposing the entire U.S. financial system to significant illicit finance risks." He added that the action sends "a clear message that even the biggest financial institution(s) are not above the law."

Those are Treasury's findings and accusations. The bank has not framed the matter as a dispute over whether problems existed. It has framed it as a cleanup already underway.

A Bank of America spokesperson said the company has "invested billions of dollars in technology and dedicated thousands of employees to combat financial crime." The spokesperson said the team is "far along with and committed to completing the work required to address the issues raised by our regulators."

The spokesperson also said the bank supports law enforcement "across thousands of investigations" and files "hundreds of thousands of suspicious activity reports each year." The bank said it is working with regulators to reach penalty resolutions.

Bernard Mensah, the bank's president of international, told CNN's Richard Quest at a panel in Bangkok that compliance is taken "very, very seriously." He said: "We spent a huge amount of resources, trying to get it right, and we think we are getting it right. But these are very high standards, and so we're working towards that."

The financial hit

The fine landed in the bank's third-quarter results. Bank of America posted $6.9 billion in profit, down roughly 17% from a year earlier.

Earnings per share came in at $0.91. The company said EPS would have been $1.08 without the Treasury charge. Analysts had forecast $1.10.

Shares fell 7.5% after the opening bell on the day the bank reported, leaving the stock down 9% for the year at that point.

A stock decline is not a measure of what any particular investor lost. It is a measure of how the market repriced the company after the fine and the earnings miss.

The China angle

The Treasury language is specific. It names Chinese money laundering networks and illicit finance on the southwest border, two areas where federal policy has stressed national security.

The agency's accusation is that the largest banks are supposed to be the first line of defense against those flows. The fine amounts to a statement that Treasury believes Bank of America did not hold that line.

The bank's side is that it spent billions on the problem and that remediation costs are already in its current expense base. Those two accounts are not necessarily contradictory. A bank can spend heavily and still fall short of what regulators require.

What the filings and statements do not settle is how long the remediation will take, and what further penalties could follow from the resolutions the bank says it is negotiating.

The build-out is on a schedule. Birmingham and Huntsville are slated for early 2027, and New Orleans for the second half of 2027.

Wisconsin's remaining 17 centers are planned through 2030. The bank says the expansion extends its in-person reach to approximately 83% of Americans.

The open question is the regulatory one. Bank of America has said it is negotiating penalty resolutions with its regulators, and the terms have not been disclosed.