In the early 1990s, brothers Daniel and Thomas Prohaska were managing a successful legal practice in estate, tax and trust planning along with real estate and business law. “Our practice was very much relationship-based,” says Tom. “When you work with people on strategies to preserve and create wealth you are dealing with basic human issues that require a strong sense of advocacy.”

Increasingly, the Prohaskas were faced with their clients' frustrations in finding local banks that offered comprehensive asset management and trust administration capabilities consistent with the estate and tax planning advice the brothers were providing. In looking over the banking industry environment it became clear to Tom and Daniel that the wave of industry consolidation that had swept the banking sector during the past two decades had left a void in local services—a void their clients keenly felt.

In the place of century-old local banking institutions a new wave of community banks emerged alongside the corporate giants. While the corporate banks lacked the personalized service and local decision-making that had characterized the older institutions they had acquired, the new community banks were limited to more traditional retail banking services. “It finally occurred to us that that if we wanted to whole-heartedly recommend a banking partner that would meet the totality of our clients' needs, we were going to have to create that bank,” says Daniel. Idaho Trust was born.

Today, Idaho Trust manages more trust, estate and investment assets than all other Idaho-based banks combined, and its success over the next twelve years resulted in its management of $360 million in investment and trust assets. By 2006, however, the Prohaska brothers faced yet another opportunity driven by client needs: the addition of personal and business banking products coupled with the level of personalized services that had characterized the bank since its inception. As clients began to rely on the bank as a trusted financial advisor, they began also to push for a single banking source. Daniel and Tom once again were drawn toward filling a void in the local banking scene: creating a “private business bank” by occupying a niche between the breadth of services of a corporate bank and the more personal relationships and local decision-making that characterized community banks.

Idaho Trust has assembled a commercial banking team boasting more than 100 years of experience. Idaho Trust has taken a very different route from other community banks that have formed in Boise over the past decade. “By starting with trust administration and investment management, and then adding banking services,” says Tom Prohaska, “we've taken an approach that recognizes the synergy between our clients' business activities and personal wealth management needs, and overlaid this approach with a service mentality that respects their accomplishments while helping them move to the next level in their financial life.”