Portal:Banks
Introduction
The Bank of England, established in 1694.
A bank is a financial institution that accepts deposits from the public and creates credit. Lending activities can be performed either directly or indirectly through capital markets. Due to their importance in the financial stability of a country, banks are highly regulated in most countries. Most nations have institutionalized a system known as fractional reserve banking under which banks hold liquid assets equal to only a portion of their current liabilities. In addition to other regulations intended to ensure liquidity, banks are generally subject to minimum capital requirements based on an international set of capital standards, known as the Basel Accords.
Banking in its modern sense evolved in the 14th century in the prosperous cities of Renaissance Italy but in many ways was a continuation of ideas and concepts of credit and lending that had their roots in the ancient world. In the history of banking, a number of banking dynasties – notably, the Medicis, the Fuggers, the Welsers, the Berenbergs, and the Rothschilds – have played a central role over many centuries. The oldest existing retail bank is Banca Monte dei Paschi di Siena, while the oldest existing merchant bank is Berenberg Bank.
Selected banking articles
Fractional-reserve banking is the common practice by commercial banks of accepting deposits, and creating credit, while holding reserves equal to a fraction of the bank's deposit liabilities. Reserves are held as currency in the bank, or as balances in the bank's accounts at the central bank. Fractional-reserve banking is the current form of banking practiced in most countries worldwide.
Fractional-reserve banking allows banks to act as financial intermediaries between borrowers and savers, and to provide longer-term loans to borrowers while providing immediate liquidity to depositors (providing the function of maturity transformation). However, a bank can experience a bank run if depositors wish to withdraw more funds than the reserves that are held by the bank. To mitigate the risks of bank runs and systemic crises (when problems are extreme and widespread), governments of most countries regulate and oversee commercial banks, provide deposit insurance and act as lender of last resort to commercial banks. Read more...- Community development bank (CDB) or Community Development Financial Institution (CDFI) is a development bank or credit union that focus on serving people who have been locked out of the traditional financial systems such as the unbanked or underbanked in deprived local communities. They emphasize the long term development of communities and provide loans such as micro-finance or venture capital.
In the United States these became popular after 1994 when the US Congress created community development banks and allowed them to get funding at very low rates from the US treasury. Read more... - A time deposit or term deposit (also known as a certificate of deposit in the United States) is an interest-bearing bank deposit with a specified period of maturity. It is a money deposit at a banking institution that cannot be withdrawn for a specific term or period of time (unless a penalty is paid). When the term is over, it can be either withdrawn or held for another term. Generally speaking, the longer the term, the better the yield on the money.
The opposite, sometimes known as a call deposit or sight deposit, is a deposit that can be withdrawn at any time, without any notice or penalty: e.g., money deposited into a checking account at a bank. Read more... - A bank card is typically a plastic card issued by a bank to its clients that performs one or more of a number of services that relate to giving the client access to bank account,if is out of business hours.
Physically, a bank card will usually have the client's name, the issuer's name, and a unique card number printed on it. It will have a magnetic strip on the back enabling various machines to read and access information. Depending on the issuing bank and the preferences of the client, this may allow the card to be used as an ATM card, enabling transactions at automatic teller machines; as debit card, linked to the client's bank account and able to be used for making purchases at the point of sale. Read more... - Money creation is the process by which the money supply of a country, or of an economic or monetary region, is increased. In most modern economies, most of the money supply is in the form of bank deposits. Central banks monitor the amount of money in the economy by measuring the so-called monetary aggregates. Read more...
- Asset quality is an evaluation of asset to measure the credit risk associated with it. Read more...
- Bank regulation is a form of government regulation which subjects banks to certain requirements, restrictions and guidelines, designed to create market transparency between banking institutions and the individuals and corporations with whom they conduct business, among other things. As regulation focusing on key actors in the financial markets, it forms one of the three components of financial law, the other two being case law and self-regulating market practices.
Given the interconnectedness of the banking industry and the reliance that the national (and global) economy hold on banks, it is important for regulatory agencies to maintain control over the standardized practices of these institutions. Supporters of such regulation often base their arguments on the "too big to fail" notion. This holds that many financial institutions (particularly investment banks with a commercial arm) hold too much control over the economy to fail without enormous consequences. This is the premise for government bailouts, in which government financial assistance is provided to banks or other financial institutions who appear to be on the brink of collapse. The belief is that without this aid, the crippled banks would not only become bankrupt, but would create rippling effects throughout the economy leading to systemic failure. Compliance with bank regulations is verified by personnel known as bank examiners. Read more... - Islamic banking or Islamic finance (Arabic: مصرفية إسلامية) or sharia-compliant finance is banking or financing activity that complies with sharia (Islamic law) and its practical application through the development of Islamic economics. Some of the modes of Islamic banking/finance include Mudarabah (profit-sharing and loss-bearing), Wadiah (safekeeping), Musharaka (joint venture), Murabahah (cost-plus), and Ijara (leasing).
Sharia prohibits riba, or usury, defined as interest paid on all loans of money (although some Muslims dispute whether there is a consensus that interest is equivalent to riba). Investment in businesses that provide goods or services considered contrary to Islamic principles (e.g. pork or alcohol) is also haraam ("sinful and prohibited"). Read more... - An investment bank is a financial services company or corporate division that engages in advisory-based financial transactions on behalf of individuals, corporations, and governments. Traditionally associated with corporate finance, such a bank might assist in raising financial capital by underwriting or acting as the client's agent in the issuance of securities. An investment bank may also assist companies involved in mergers and acquisitions (M&A) and provide ancillary services such as market making, trading of derivatives and equity securities, and FICC services (fixed income instruments, currencies, and commodities). Most investment banks maintain prime brokerage and asset management departments in conjunction with their investment research businesses. As an industry, it is broken up into the Bulge Bracket (upper tier), Middle Market (mid-level businesses), and boutique market (specialized businesses).
Unlike commercial banks and retail banks, investment banks do not take deposits. From the passage of Glass–Steagall Act in 1933 until its repeal in 1999 by the Gramm–Leach–Bliley Act, the United States maintained a separation between investment banking and commercial banks. Other industrialized countries, including G7 countries, have historically not maintained such a separation. As part of the Dodd–Frank Wall Street Reform and Consumer Protection Act of 2010 (Dodd–Frank Act of 2010), the Volcker Rule asserts some institutional separation of investment banking services from commercial banking. Read more... - Private banks are the banks owned by either the individual or a general partner(s) with limited partner(s). Private banks are not incorporated. In any such case, the creditors can look to both the "entirety of the bank's assets" as well as the entirety of the sole-proprietor's/general-partners' assets.
These banks have a long tradition in Switzerland, dating back to at least the Revocation of the Edict of Nantes (1685). Private banks also have a long tradition in the UK where C. Hoare & Co. has been in business since 1672. Read more... - The 2010 United States foreclosure crisis, sometimes referred to as Foreclosure-gate or Foreclosuregate, refers to a widespread epidemic of improper foreclosures initiated by large banks and other lenders. The foreclosure crisis was extensively covered by news outlets beginning in October 2010, and several large banks, including Bank of America, JP Morgan, Wells Fargo, and Citigroup temporarily responded by halting their foreclosure proceedings in some or all states. The foreclosure crisis caused significant investor fear in the U.S. A 2014 study published in the American Journal of Public Health linked the foreclosure crisis to an increase in suicide rates.
One out of every 248 households in the United States received a foreclosure notice in September 2012, according to RealtyTrac. Read more... 
Depositors "run" on a failing New York City bank in an effort to recover their money, July 1914
A bank failure occurs when a bank is unable to meet its obligations to its depositors or other creditors because it has become insolvent or too illiquid to meet its liabilities. More specifically, a bank usually fails economically when the market value of its assets declines to a value that is less than the market value of its liabilities. The insolvent bank either borrows from other solvent banks or sells its assets at a lower price than its market value to generate liquid money to pay its depositors on demand. The inability of the solvent banks to lend liquid money to the insolvent bank creates a bank panic among the depositors as more depositors try to take out cash deposits from the bank. As such, the bank is unable to fulfill the demands of all of its depositors on time. Also, a bank may be taken over by the regulating government agency if Shareholders Equity (i.e. capital ratios) are below the regulatory minimum.
The failure of a bank is generally considered to be of more importance than the failure of other types of business firms because of the interconnectedness and fragility of banking institutions. Research has shown that the market value of customers of the failed banks is adversely affected at the date of the failure announcements. It is often feared that the spill over effects of a failure of one bank can quickly spread throughout the economy and possibly result in the failure of other banks, whether or not those banks were solvent at the time as the marginal depositors try to take out cash deposits from these banks to avoid from suffering losses. Thereby, the spill over effect of bank panic or systemic risk has a multiplier effect on all banks and financial institutions leading to a greater effect of bank failure in the economy. As a result, banking institutions are typically subjected to rigorous regulation, and bank failures are of major public policy concern in countries across the world. Read more...- The 100 point check is a personal identification system adopted by the Australian Government to combat financial transaction fraud by individuals and companies, enacted by the Financial Transactions Reports Act (1988) (FTR Act), which established the Australian Transaction Reports and Analysis Centre (AUSTRAC) and which continued in existence under the Anti-Money Laundering and Counter-Terrorism Financing Act 2006.
The 100 point system applies to individuals opening new financial accounts in Australia, including bank accounts or betting accounts. Points are allocated to the types of documentary proof of identity that the person can produce, and they must have at least 100 points of identification to be able to operate an account. The system now also applies to the establishment of a number of official identity documents, such as an Australian passport and driving licence.
Additionally, 100 point checking also applies in superannuation. Members are required to provide 100 points of ID when applying to transfer their accumulation funds (receiving monies) to a Pension based fund (paying monies).
"Reporting entities" are required to identify their customers using the 100 point check system. Accounts may be opened, but can only be operated (i.e. withdrawals made) by an identified customer; and an unidentified customer is blocked from making withdrawals. Generally, identification can be transferred from one account to another, so that for instance a person once identified does not need to produce documents again when opening a second account at the same institution. Read more... - Postal savings systems provide depositors who do not have access to banks a safe and convenient method to save money. Many nations have operated banking systems involving post offices to promote saving money among the poor. Read more...
- An industrial loan company (ILC) or industrial bank is a financial institution in the United States that lends money, and may be owned by non-financial institutions. They provide niche financial services nationwide. ILCs offer FDIC-insured deposits and are subject to FDIC and state regulator oversight. All "FDIC-insured entities are subject to Sections 23A and 23B of the Federal Reserve Act, which limits bank transactions with affiliates, including the non-bank parent company." (FDIC.gov) ILCs are permitted to have branches in multiple states (which is permitted by many states on a reciprocal basis). They are regulated and supervised by state-charters and insured by the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation. They are authorized to make consumer and commercial loans and accept federally insured deposits. Banks may not accept demand deposits if the bank has total assets greater than $100 million. ILCs are exempted from the Bank Holding Company Act.
ILCs assist numerous charities and provide millions of dollars annually in grants, low interest loans, and service through the Community Reinvestment Act (CRA). Currently, only seven states offer an ILC bank charter. Most ILCs have been chartered by the Utah Department of Financial Institutions. Other states permitting ILCs include California, Colorado, Minnesota, Indiana, Hawaii, and Nevada. Read more... - A bank holding company is a company that controls one or more banks, but does not necessarily engage in banking itself. The compound bancorp (banc/bank + corp[oration]) is often used to refer to these companies as well. Read more...
- The Rhode Island banking crisis took place in the early 1990s, when approximately a third of the US state of Rhode Island's population lost access to funds in their bank accounts. The events were triggered by the failure of a Providence bank, Heritage Loan & Investment, due to long-term embezzlement by its president. News of its problems led to a bank run in which customers tried to withdraw money from the bank which did not have enough money available. In normal circumstances, depositors would be protected by the bank's insurance, but the state's private insurer had a long history of problems and was unable to fulfill its commitments. When the insurer collapsed, Governor Bruce Sundlun announced the closure of 45 credit unions and banks just hours after his inauguration.
In the first banking emergency in the state since the Great Depression, 300,000 depositors lost access to their money. Though some of the institutions reopened relatively quickly after obtaining federal insurance, many did not qualify and remained closed for an extended period of time. The state government set up an agency to manage the crisis, selling $697 million in bonds to repay people while filing about 300 lawsuits against the closed institutions and other companies that played a role in the crisis. Read more... - The Christmas club is a savings program that was first offered by various banks and credit unions in the United States beginning in the first half of the 20th century, and including the Great Depression. The concept is that bank customers deposit a set amount of money each week into a special savings account, and receive the money back at the end of the year for Christmas shopping. Read more...
Selected banks
- Washington Mutual, Inc—abbreviated to WaMu—was a savings bank holding company and the former owner of WaMu Bank; America's largest savings and loan association until its collapse in 2008.
On Thursday, September 25, 2008, the United States Office of Thrift Supervision (OTS) seized WaMu Bank from WaMu, Inc. and placed it into receivership with the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation (FDIC). The OTS took the action due to the withdrawal of $16.7 billion in deposits during a 9-day bank run (amounting to 9% of the deposits it had held on June 30, 2008). The FDIC sold the banking subsidiaries (minus unsecured debt and equity claims) to JPMorgan Chase for $1.9 billion, which JPMorgan Chase had been planning to acquire as part of a confidential plan internally nicknamed Project West. All WaMu branches were rebranded as Chase branches by the end of 2009. The holding company, WaMu, Inc., was left with $33 billion in assets, and $8 billion debt, after being stripped of its banking subsidiary by the FDIC. The next day, WaMu, Inc. filed for Chapter 11 voluntary bankruptcy in Delaware, where it was incorporated. Read more...
JPMorgan Chase & Co. is an American multinational investment bank and financial services company headquartered in New York City. JPMorgan Chase is the largest bank in the United States, and is ranked by S&P Global as the sixth largest bank in the world by total assets , to the amount of $2.535 trillion. It is the world's most valuable bank by market capitalization.
As a "Bulge Bracket" bank, it is a major provider of various investment banking and financial services. It is one of America's Big Four banks, along with Bank of America, Citigroup, and Wells Fargo. JPMorgan Chase is considered to be a universal bank and a custodian bank. The J.P. Morgan brand, historically known as Morgan, is used by the investment banking, asset management, private banking, private wealth management, and treasury & securities services divisions. Fiduciary activity within private banking and private wealth management is done under the aegis of JPMorgan Chase Bank, N.A.—the actual trustee. The Chase brand is used for credit card services in the United States and Canada, the bank's retail banking activities in the United States, and commercial banking. Both the retail and commercial bank and the bank's corporate headquarters are located at 270 Park Avenue in Midtown Manhattan, New York City. The company was formed in 2000, when Chase Manhattan Corporation merged with J.P. Morgan & Co. Read more...- Industrial and Commercial Bank of China Limited (abb. ICBC) is a Chinese multinational banking company. It is the largest bank in China, and the largest bank in the world by total assets, deposits, loans, number of customers and number of employees. It is one of China's "Big Four" state-owned commercial banks (the other three being the Bank of China, Agricultural Bank of China, and China Construction Bank). It was founded as a limited company on January 1, 1984. As of December 2017, it had assets worth US$4.009 trillion. Generally considered the largest financial institution and public company in the world by assets; it is the first Chinese bank to achieve such a feat. It ranks number 1 in The Banker's Top 1000 World Banks ranking, and first on the Forbes Global 2000 list of the world's biggest public companies. Read more...
Société Générale S.A. (French: [sɔ.sje.te ʒe.ne.ʁal]), often nicknamed "SocGen" (French: [soc-ʒen]), is a French multinational investment bank and financial services company headquartered in Paris, France. The company is a universal bank and has divisions supporting French Networks, Global Transaction Banking, International Retail Banking, Financial Services, Corporate and Investment Banking, Private Banking, Asset Management and Securities Services.
Société Générale is France's third largest bank by total assets, sixth largest in Europe or seventeenth by market capitalization. The company is a component of the Euro Stoxx 50 stock market index. It is known as one of the Trois Vieilles ("Old Three") of French banking, along with BNP Paribas and Crédit Lyonnais. Read more...
HSBC Holdings plc is a British multinational banking and financial services holding company. It was the 7th largest bank in the world by 2018, and the largest in Europe, with total assets of US$2.558 trillion (). HSBC traces its origin to a hong in Hong Kong, and its present form was established in London by the Hongkong and Shanghai Banking Corporation to act as a new group holding company in 1991. The origins of the bank lie mainly in Hong Kong and to a lesser extent in Shanghai, where branches were first opened in 1865. The HSBC name is derived from the initials of the Hongkong and Shanghai Banking Corporation. The company was first formally incorporated in 1866.
HSBC has around 3,900 offices in 67 countries and territories across Africa, Asia, Oceania, Europe, North America, and South America, and around 38 million customers. As of 2014, it was the world's sixth-largest public company, according to a composite measure by Forbes magazine. Read more...
The Chase Tower (formerly the Bank One Plaza) housed the Bank One headquarters
Bank One Corporation was the sixth-largest bank in the United States. It traded on the New York Stock Exchange under the stock symbol ONE. The company merged with JPMorgan Chase & Co. on July 1, 2004. The company had its headquarters in the Bank One Plaza (now the Chase Tower) in the Chicago Loop in Chicago, Illinois, now the headquarters of Chase's retail banking division.
The bank traces its roots to the Ohio-based First Banc Group, that was formed in 1968 as a holding company for the City National Bank in Columbus, Ohio. Read more...
The ING Group (Dutch: ING Groep) is a Dutch multinational banking and financial services corporation headquartered in Amsterdam. Its primary businesses are retail banking, direct banking, commercial banking, investment banking, asset management, and insurance services. With total assets of US$ 1.1 trillion, it is one of the biggest banks in the world. ING is an abbreviation for Internationale Nederlanden Groep (English: International Netherlands Group).
The orange lion on ING's logo alludes to the Group's Dutch origins. ING is the Dutch member of the Inter-Alpha Group of Banks, a cooperative consortium of 11 prominent European banks. ING Bank was included in a list of global systemically important banks in 2012. Read more...- The Royal Bank of Canada (RBC; French: Banque Royale du Canada) is a Canadian multinational financial services company and the largest bank in Canada by market capitalization. The bank serves over 16 million clients and has 80,000 employees worldwide. The bank was founded in 1864 in Halifax, Nova Scotia, while its corporate headquarters are located in Montreal, Quebec, and in Toronto, Ontario. RBC's Institution Number (or bank number) is 003. In November 2017, RBC was added to the Financial Stability Board's list of global systemically important banks.
In Canada, the bank's personal and commercial banking operations are branded as RBC Royal Bank in English and RBC Banque Royale in French and serves approximately ten million clients through its network of 1,209 branches. RBC Bank is the U.S. banking subsidiary which formerly operated 439 branches across six states in the Southeastern United States, but now only offers cross-border banking services to Canadian travellers and expats. RBC also has 127 branches across seventeen countries in the Caribbean, which serve more than 16 million clients. RBC Capital Markets is RBC's worldwide investment and corporate banking subsidiary, while the investment brokerage firm is known as RBC Dominion Securities. Investment banking services are also provided through RBC Bank and the focus is on middle market clients. Read more...
The Goldman Sachs Group, Inc., is an American multinational investment bank and financial services company headquartered in New York City. It offers services in investment management, securities, asset management, prime brokerage, and securities underwriting.
The bank is one of the largest investment banking enterprises in the world, and is a primary dealer in the United States Treasury security market and more generally, a prominent market maker. The group also owns Goldman Sachs Bank USA, a direct bank. Goldman Sachs was founded in 1869 and is headquartered at 200 West Street in Lower Manhattan with additional offices in other international financial centers. Read more...
UniCredit S.p.A. is an Italian global banking and financial services company. Its network spans 50 markets in 17 countries, with more than 8,500 branches and over 147,000 employees. Its strategic position in Western and Eastern Europe gives the group one of the region's highest market shares. The company is a component of the Euro Stoxx 50 stock market index. Read more...- Bank of China (Chinese: 中国银行; pinyin: Zhōngguó Yínháng; often abbreviated as 中行 or BOC) is one of the four biggest state-owned commercial banks in China. Bank of China is legally separate from its subsidiary Bank of China (Hong Kong), although they maintain close relations in management and administration and co-operate in several areas including reselling BOC's insurance and securities services.
It was founded in 1912 by the Republican government to replace the Daqing Bank. It is the oldest bank in mainland China still in existence. From its establishment until 1942, it issued banknotes on behalf of the Government along with the "Big Four" banks of the period: the Farmers Bank of China, Bank of Communications and Central Bank of the Republic of China. Its headquarters are in Xicheng District, Beijing. Read more...
Caixa Geral de Depósitos (CGD) (Portuguese pronunciation: [ˈkajʃɐ ʒɨˈɾaɫ dɨ dɨˈpɔzituʃ]) is a Portuguese state-owned banking corporation, and the second largest bank in Portugal. CGD is Portugal's largest public sector banking corporation, established in Lisbon in 1876.
CGD now has presence in 23 countries spanning four continents through branches, representative offices or direct equity interests in local financial institutions. CGD is the largest Portuguese financial group, with the highest domestic market shares in key areas such as customer deposits, loans and advances to customers, mortgages, insurance, mutual funds and real estate leasing (11.4%). Based on assets, it ranks 109 in terms of the world’s major banks. CGD is the 69th largest European bank. Read more...- Mitsubishi UFJ Financial Group, Inc. (MUFG; 株式会社三菱UFJフィナンシャル・グループ Kabushiki Gaisha Mitsubishi Yūefujei Finansharu Gurūpu) is a Japanese bank holding / financial services company headquartered in Chiyoda, Tokyo, Japan.
MUFG holds assets of around US$2,459 billion as of 2016, making it the world's fifth largest bank by total assets and is one of the main companies of the Mitsubishi Group. It is Japan's largest financial group and the world's second largest bank holding company holding around US$1.8 trillion (JPY 148 trillion) in deposits as of March 2011. The letters MUFG come from Mitsubishi and United Financial of Japan, the name of an acquired company. Read more...
Lloyds Banking Group plc is a major British financial institution formed through the acquisition of HBOS by Lloyds TSB in 2009. The Group's history stems from the founding in 1695 by the Parliament of Scotland of the Bank of Scotland, which is the second oldest bank in the United Kingdom. The Group's headquarters is located at 25 Gresham Street in the City of London and its registered office is on The Mound in Edinburgh. Lloyds Banking Group's activities are organised into: Retail Banking (including Mortgages and Sole Traders); Commercial; Life, Pensions & Insurance; and Wealth & International. Lloyds' has extensive overseas operations in the US, Europe, the Middle East and Asia. Its headquarters for business in the European Union is in Berlin, Germany.
Following the takeover, the Group stopped using the name HBOS publicly. The Halifax brand, products and pricing were discontinued in Scotland until it was re-established in 2013. The Halifax and Lloyds Bank brands are used in England and Wales and the Bank of Scotland and Halifax brand is used in Scotland, each offering different products and pricing. Lloyds Banking Group's CEO António Horta-Osório told The Banker, "We will keep the different brands because the customers are very different in terms of attitude". Read more...
Danske Bank A/S is a Danish bank. It was founded 5 October 1871 as Den Danske Landmandsbank, Hypothek- og Vexelbank i Kjøbenhavn (The Danish Farmers' Bank, Mortgage and Exchange Bank of Copenhagen). Headquartered in Copenhagen, it is the largest bank in Denmark and a major retail bank in the northern European region with over 5 million retail customers. Danske Bank was number 454 on the Fortune Global 500 list for 2011. Read more...- Bank of Communications Limited (BoCom or BoComm) (simplified Chinese: 交通银行; traditional Chinese: 交通銀行; pinyin: Jiāotōng Yínháng; often abbreviated as 交行; Jiāoháng), founded in 1908, is the fifth-largest bank in mainland China.
Established in 1908, the Bank of Communications claims a long history in China and is one of the banks to have issued banknotes in modern Chinese history. It was listed on the Stock Exchange of Hong Kong in June 2005 and the Shanghai Stock Exchange in May 2007. Read more... - The Laurentian Bank of Canada (LBC) (French: Banque Laurentienne du Canada) is a financial institution founded in 1846 that operates throughout Canada. The Bank caters to the needs of retail clients via its branch network based in Quebec. The Bank also stands out for its know-how among small and medium-sized enterprises and real estate developers owing to its specialized teams across Canada. Its subsidiary B2B Bank is, for its part, one of the major Canadian leaders in providing banking products and services and investment accounts through independent advisors and brokers. Laurentian Bank Securities offers integrated brokerage services to a clientele of institutional and retail investors. Read more...
The State Bank of India (SBI) is an Indian multinational, public sector banking and financial services statutory body. It is a government corporation statutory body headquartered in Mumbai, Maharashtra. SBI is ranked as 216th in the Fortune Global 500 list of the world's biggest corporations of 2018. It is the largest bank in India with a 23% market share in assets, besides a share of one-fourth of the total loan and deposits market.
The bank descends from the Bank of Calcutta, founded in 1806, via the Imperial Bank of India, making it the oldest commercial bank in the Indian subcontinent. The Bank of Madras merged into the other two "presidency banks" in British India, the Bank of Calcutta and the Bank of Bombay, to form the Imperial Bank of India, which in turn became the State Bank of India in 1955. The Government of India took control of the Imperial Bank of India in 1955, with Reserve Bank of India (India's central bank) taking a 60% stake, renaming it the State Bank of India. Read more...
The Bear Stearns Companies, Inc. was a New York-based global investment bank, securities trading and brokerage firm that failed in 2008 as part of the global financial crisis and recession, and was subsequently sold to JPMorgan Chase. Its main business areas before its failure were capital markets, investment banking, wealth management, and global clearing services, and it was heavily involved in the subprime mortgage crisis.
In the years leading up to the failure, Bear Stearns was heavily involved in securitization and issued large amounts of asset-backed securities, which were in the case of mortgages pioneered by Lewis Ranieri, "the father of mortgage securities". As investor losses mounted in those markets in 2006 and 2007, the company actually increased its exposure, especially to the mortgage-backed assets that were central to the subprime mortgage crisis. In March 2008, the Federal Reserve Bank of New York provided an emergency loan to try to avert a sudden collapse of the company. The company could not be saved however and was sold to JPMorgan Chase for $10 per share, a price far below its pre-crisis 52-week high of $133.20 per share, but not as low as the $2 per share originally agreed upon by Bear Stearns and JPMorgan Chase. Read more...
The European Central Bank (ECB) is the central bank for the euro and administers monetary policy within the Eurozone, which comprises 19 member states of the European Union and is one of the largest monetary areas in the world. Established by the Treaty of Amsterdam, the ECB is one of the world's most important central banks and serves as one of seven institutions of the European Union, being enshrined in the Treaty on European Union (TEU). The bank's capital stock is owned by all 28 central banks of each EU member state. The current President of the ECB is Mario Draghi. Headquartered in Frankfurt, Germany, the bank formerly occupied the Eurotower prior to the construction of its new seat.
The primary objective of the ECB, mandated in Article 2 of the Statute of the ECB, is to maintain price stability within the Eurozone. Its basic tasks, set out in Article 3 of the Statute, are to set and implement the monetary policy for the Eurozone, to conduct foreign exchange operations, to take care of the foreign reserves of the European System of Central Banks and operation of the financial market infrastructure under the TARGET2 payments system and the technical platform (currently being developed) for settlement of securities in Europe (TARGET2 Securities). The ECB has, under Article 16 of its Statute, the exclusive right to authorise the issuance of euro banknotes. Member states can issue euro coins, but the amount must be authorised by the ECB beforehand. Read more...
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Did you know...
- ... that siderography, a process to produce counterfeit-resistant banknotes, was submitted for an 1817 Bank of England contest in an era when English banknotes were known as "filthy rags"?
- ... that £100,000,000 notes known as "Titans" are locked away in the Bank of England?
- ... that the Gutenberg Bible held by the Diocesan Museum in Pelplin survived World War II in Canada, kept in a vault at the Bank of Montreal until 1959?
- ... that the Katihar Medical College campus includes a 590-bed general hospital and a branch of the State Bank of India?
- ... that Alfred Clayton Cole, a director of the Bank of England, said: "during any time of crisis ... all that the Bank is called upon to do is to take care of itself"?
- ... that after surviving a shooting incident, Boakye Agyarko immigrated to the US as a political refugee and rose to become a vice president of the Bank of New York?
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Selected images
Safra National Bank, New York
Large door to an old bank vault.
Bank of Commerce in Regina, 1910
OTP Bank in Prešov (Slovakia)
National Bank of the Republic, Salt Lake City 1908
A branch of Union Bank in, Visakhapatnam
Branch of the Standard Bank of Canada in Markham, Ontario, shown in 1912.
Sealing of the Bank of England Charter (1694), by Lady Jane Lindsay, 1905.
Carved sign for The Standard Bank of Canada, in Brechin, Ontario.
An HSBC branch in Markham, Ontario.
A branch of Banco de Oro in Metro Manila, Philippines
An AMRO bank in 1973
Branch of Nepal Bank in Pokhara, Western Nepal.
Among many other things, the Code of Hammurabi from 1754 BC recorded interest-bearing loans.
Suburban bank branch
An interior of a branch of National Westminster Bank on Castle Street, Liverpool
National Copper Bank, Salt Lake City 1911
A Banco do Brasil office in São Paulo, Brazil, the bank is the largest financial institution in Brazil and Latin America.
HSBC Bank Canada headquarters in Vancouver, British Columbia.
A NatWest mobile banking van in the town of Berkeley, Gloucestershire, England. The van visits Berkeley for two hours each Thursday following the closure of the town's NatWest branch in 2015.
Global headquarters of the Bank for International Settlements in Basel
Citibank, The People's Trust Company Building, Brooklyn, New York City.
The Bank of Finland, Helsinki, with the statue of Johan Vilhelm Snellman in front
A former building society, now a modern retail bank in Leeds, West Yorkshire.
Bank of Finland strong box which moved to Helsinki with the bank when it relocated from Turku.
An HSBC Canada branch in Richmond Hill, Ontario
An HSBC Bank Canada branch in Yorkville, Toronto.
An American bank in Maryland.
Standard Bank of Canada branch in Brechin, Ontario. Empty as of 2014, the building was later used as a Canadian Imperial Bank of Commerce branch, until they moved to the other side of the street.
The Bank of England, established in 1694.
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In the news
- 25 June 2019 –
- The Reserve Bank of Zimbabwe announces that, effective immediately, foreign currencies such as the United States dollar or South African rand will no longer be legal tender in the country, and that any use of foreign currency within Zimbabwe will be a punishable offense. (Deutsche Welle)
