(1) DEFINED.—For the purposes of this section, the term “foreign savings bank” includes any domestic joint venture, business trust, syndicate, firm, company, savings bank, fiduciary, partnership, or corporation, and all other groups or combinations, by whatever name called, actually engaged in the business of a savings bank, the principal business office of which is located outside the territorial limits of this state.

(2) ACTION BY OFFICE.—The office is authorized, empowered, and directed to obtain an injunction or to take any other action necessary to prevent any foreign savings bank from unlawfully doing any business of a savings bank in this state.

(3) ACTIVITIES NOT CONSIDERED “DOING BUSINESS.”—For the purposes of this section and any other law of this state prohibiting, limiting, or regulating the doing of business in this state by foreign savings banks or foreign corporations of any type, any federal savings bank, the principal office of which is located outside this state, and any foreign savings bank which is subject to state or federal supervision, or both, which by law are subject to periodic examination by such supervisory authority and to a requirement of periodic audit, shall not be considered to be doing business in this state by reason of engaging in any of the following activities:

(a) The purchase, acquisition, holding, sale, assignment, transfer, collecting, and enforcement of obligations or any interest therein secured by real estate mortgages or other instruments in the nature of a mortgage, covering real property located in this state, or the foreclosure of such instruments, or the acquisition of title to such property by foreclosure, or otherwise, as a result of default under such instruments, or the holding, protection, rental, maintenance, and operation of the property so acquired, or the disposition thereof, provided such savings banks shall not hold, own, or operate such property for a period exceeding 5 years without securing the approval of the office.

(b) The advertising or solicitation of savings accounts or the making of any representation with respect thereto in this state through the medium of mail, radio, television, magazines, or newspapers or any other medium which is published or circulated within this state, provided that such advertising, solicitation, or the making of such representations is accurately descriptive of the facts.

History.—s. 15, ch. 97-30; s. 1871, ch. 2003-261.