Portal:Banks

The Banks and Banking Portal

The Bank of England, established in 1694

A bank is a financial institution that accepts deposits from the public and creates a demand deposit while simultaneously making loans. Lending activities can be directly performed by the bank or indirectly through capital markets.

As banks play an important role in financial stability and the economy of a country, most jurisdictions exercise a high degree of regulation over banks. Most countries 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, the Basel Accords. (Full article...)

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Selected banking articles

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World map showing real GDP growth rates for 2009; countries in brown were in a recession.

The Great Recession was a period of market decline in economies around the world that occurred from late 2007 to mid-2009. The scale and timing of the recession varied from country to country (see map). At the time, the International Monetary Fund (IMF) concluded that it was the most severe economic and financial meltdown since the Great Depression.

The causes of the Great Recession include a combination of vulnerabilities that developed in the financial system, along with a series of triggering events that began with the bursting of the United States housing bubble in 2005–2012. When housing prices fell and homeowners began to abandon their mortgages, the value of mortgage-backed securities held by investment banks declined in 2007–2008, causing several to collapse or be bailed out in September 2008. This 2007–2008 phase was called the subprime mortgage crisis. (Full article...)
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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." 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. (Full article...)
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Participation banking is a name given to Islamic banks mainly in Turkey, as well as in the broader MENA region. There are participation banks in Turkey, Pakistan, Bangladesh, Indonesia, Saudi Arabia, Malaysia, the UAE and other Gulf countries. (Full article...)
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The Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation (FDIC) is a United States government corporation supplying deposit insurance to depositors in American commercial banks and savings banks. The FDIC was created by the Banking Act of 1933, enacted during the Great Depression to restore trust in the American banking system. More than one-third of banks failed in the years before the FDIC's creation, and bank runs were common. The insurance limit was initially US$2,500 per ownership category, and this has been increased several times over the years. Since the enactment of the Dodd–Frank Wall Street Reform and Consumer Protection Act in 2010, the FDIC insures deposits in member banks up to $250,000 per ownership category. FDIC insurance is backed by the full faith and credit of the government of the United States, and according to the FDIC, "since its start in 1933 no depositor has ever lost a penny of FDIC-insured funds".

Deposits placed with non-bank fintech financial technology companies are not protected by the FDIC against failure of the fintech company. If the company places the money in an FDIC-insured bank account consumers are protected only under some conditions. (Full article...)
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A time deposit or term deposit (also known as a certificate of deposit in the United States, and as a guaranteed investment certificate in Canada) is a deposit in a financial institution with a specific maturity date or a period to maturity, commonly referred to as its "term". Time deposits differ from at call deposits, such as savings or checking accounts, which can be withdrawn at any time, without any notice or penalty. Deposits that require notice of withdrawal to be given are effectively time deposits, though they do not have a fixed maturity date.

Unlike a certificate of deposit and bonds, a time deposit is generally not negotiable; it is not transferable by the depositor, so that depositors need to deal with the financial institution when they need to prematurely cash out of the deposit. (Full article...)
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The passbook was the traditional record of savings account transactions before the use of the internet.

A savings account is a bank account at a retail bank. Common features include a limited number of withdrawals, a lack of cheque and linked debit card facilities, limited transfer options and the inability to be overdrawn. Traditionally, transactions on savings accounts were widely recorded in a passbook, and were sometimes called passbook savings accounts, and bank statements were not provided; however, currently such transactions are commonly recorded electronically and accessible online.

People deposit funds in savings account for a variety of reasons, including a safe place to hold their cash. Savings accounts normally pay interest as well: almost all of them accrue compound interest over time. Several countries require savings accounts to be protected by deposit insurance and some countries provide a government guarantee for at least a portion of the account balance. (Full article...)
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A 2007 run on Northern Rock, a British bank

The Diamond–Dybvig model is an influential model of bank runs and related financial crises. The model shows how banks' mix of illiquid assets (such as business or mortgage loans) and liquid liabilities (deposits which may be withdrawn at any time) may give rise to self-fulfilling panics among depositors. Douglas Diamond and Philip H. Dybvig, along with Ben Bernanke, were the recipients of the 2022 Nobel Prize in Economics for their work on the Diamond-Dybvig model. (Full article...)
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A money market account (MMA) or money market deposit account (MMDA) is a deposit account that pays interest based on current interest rates in the money markets. The interest rates paid are generally higher than those of savings accounts and transaction accounts; however, some banks will require higher minimum balances in money market accounts to avoid monthly fees and to earn interest.

Money market accounts should not be confused with money market funds, which are mutual funds that invest in money market securities. (Full article...)
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The Society for Worldwide Interbank Financial Telecommunication (SWIFT), legally S.W.I.F.T. SC, is a cooperative established in 1973 in Belgium (French: Société Coopérative) and owned by the banks and other member firms that use its service. SWIFT provides the main messaging network through which international payments are initiated. It also sells software and services to financial institutions, mostly for use on its proprietary "SWIFTNet", and assigns ISO 9362 Business Identifier Codes (BICs), popularly known as "Swift codes".

As of 2018, around half of all high-value cross-border payments worldwide used the Swift network, and in 2015, Swift linked more than 11,000 financial institutions in over 200 countries and territories, who were exchanging an average of over 32 million messages per day (compared to an average of 2.4 million daily messages in 1995). (Full article...)
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Logo of the Office of the Comptroller of the Currency

The Office of the Comptroller of the Currency (OCC) is an independent bureau within the United States Department of the Treasury that was established by the National Currency Act of 1863 and serves to charter, regulate, and supervise all national banks and federal thrift institutions and the federally licensed branches and agencies of foreign banks in the United States. The acting comptroller of the currency is Rodney E. Hood, who took office on February 10, 2025. (Full article...)

Selected banks

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Citigroup Inc. or Citi (stylized as citi) is an American multinational investment bank and financial services company based in New York City. The company was formed in 1998 by the merger of Citicorp, the bank holding company for Citibank, and Travelers; Travelers was spun off from the company in 2002.

Citigroup is the third-largest banking institution in the United States by assets; alongside JPMorgan Chase, Bank of America, and Wells Fargo, it is one of the Big Four banking institutions of the United States. It is considered a systemically important bank by the Financial Stability Board, and is commonly cited as being "too big to fail". It is one of the eight global investment banks in the Bulge Bracket. Citigroup is ranked 36th on the Fortune 500, and was ranked #24 in Forbes Global 2000 in 2023. (Full article...)
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HSBC Holdings plc (Chinese: 滙豐; initialism from its founding member The Hongkong and Shanghai Banking Corporation) is a British universal bank and financial services group headquartered in London, England, with historical and business links to East Asia and a multinational footprint. It is the largest Europe-based bank by total assets, ahead of BNP Paribas, with US$3.098 trillion as of September 2024. This also puts it as the 7th largest bank in the world by total assets behind Bank of America, and the 3rd largest non-state owned bank in the world.

In 2021, HSBC had $10.8 trillion in assets under custody (AUC) and $4.9 trillion in assets under administration (AUA). (Full article...)
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Tours Société Générale, the company's headquarters in La Défense near Paris

Société Générale S.A. (French: [sɔsjete ʒeneʁal]), colloquially known in English-speaking countries as SocGen (pronounced [sɔk ʒɛn]), is a French multinational universal bank and financial services company founded in 1864. It is registered in downtown Paris and headquartered nearby in La Défense.

Société Générale is France's third largest bank by total assets after BNP Paribas and Crédit Agricole. It is also the sixth largest bank in Europe and the world's eighteenth. It is considered to be a systemically important bank by the Financial Stability Board. It has been designated as a Significant Institution since the entry into force of European Banking Supervision in late 2014, and as a consequence is directly supervised by the European Central Bank. (Full article...)
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Head office at Estonia puiestee 13 in Tallinn, erected 1935 on a design by architects Eugen Habermann and Herbert Johanson

The Bank of Estonia (Estonian: Eesti Pank) is the national central bank for Estonia within the Eurosystem. It was the Estonian central bank from 1919 to 2010 (albeit with a long suspension between 1940 and 1989), issuing the kroon. (Full article...)
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Headquarters in Ōtemachi, Chiyoda, Tokyo
Japan Post Bank Co., Ltd. (株式会社ゆうちょ銀行, Kabushiki gaisha Yūcho Ginkō) is a Japanese bank headquartered in Tokyo. It is a corporation held by Japan Post Holdings, in which the government of Japan has a majority stake.

It is a major financial institution that started in 1875 as a postal savings system, and that still today continues to operate primarily out of post office branches. It manages over ¥205 trillion of assets and offers services in almost 24,000 branches across Japan. At times in its history, it was the largest financial institution in the world. Since its conception, it has played a significant role in both making economic services to people in Japan and making investments towards the economic and industrial development of the country. (Full article...)
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ING Group N.V. (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, wholesale banking, private banking, asset management, and insurance services. With total assets of US$967.8 billion, it is one of the biggest banks in the world, and consistently ranks among the largest banks globally.

ING is the Dutch member of the Inter-Alpha Group of Banks, a co-operative consortium of 11 prominent European banks. Since in 2012, ING Bank is a member in the list of global systemically important banks. It has been designated as a Significant Institution since the entry into force of European Banking Supervision in late 2014, and as a consequence is directly supervised by the European Central Bank. (Full article...)
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The Laurentian Bank of Canada (LBC; French: Banque Laurentienne du Canada) is a Schedule 1 bank that operates primarily in the province of Quebec, with commercial and business banking offices located in Ontario, Alberta, British Columbia, and Nova Scotia. LBC's Institution Number (or routing number) is 039.

The institution was established as the Montreal City and District Savings Bank in 1846. The bank's shares were publicly listed on the Montreal Stock Exchange in 1965 and the Toronto Stock Exchange in 1983. In 1987, the institution was renamed the Laurentian Bank of Canada. (Full article...)
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The Industrial and Commercial Bank of China (ICBC; Chinese: 中国工商银行) is a Chinese partially state-owned multinational banking and financial services corporation headquartered in Beijing, China. It is the largest of the "big four" banks in China, and the largest bank in the world by total assets. ICBC was created on 1 January 1984 from what were then the commercial banking operations of the People's Bank of China. ICBC is majority-owned by the Chinese government and has remained so after its landmark initial public offering in 2006. As end of 2021, ICBC shareholders included Central Huijin Investment (34.7 percent), the Chinese Ministry of Finance (31.1 percent), the National Council for Social Security Fund (3.5 percent), adding up to 69.3 percent under the ultimate control of the Ministry of Finance.

ICBC became the world's largest bank by total assets in 2012 (based on year-end balance sheet) and has kept this rank ever since. It was ranked first on the Forbes Global 2000 list of the world's top public companies in 2015. On 31 December 2022, it was the third-largest bank in the world by market capitalization at $211 billion. It is one of the most profitable companies in the world, ranking fourth according to Forbes in 2022. It has been designated a systemically important bank by the Financial Stability Board (FSB) since the start of the FSB's listing. (Full article...)
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Shinhan Bank Co., Ltd. (Korean: 주식회사 신한은행; RR: Jusikhoesa Sinhan Eunhaeng) is a South-Korean bank headquartered in Seoul. It was founded under this name in 1982, but through its merger with Chohung Bank in 2006, traces its origins to the Hanseong Bank (est. 1897), one of the first banks to be established in Korea. It is part of the Shinhan Financial Group, along with Jeju Bank.
As of 2016^[update], Shinhan Bank had total assets of ₩298.945 trillion (equivalent to ₩304.658 trillion or US$269.507 billion in 2017)^[1], total deposits of ₩221.047 trillion (equivalent to ₩225.271 trillion or US$199.28 billion in 2017)^[1] and loans of ₩212.228 trillion (equivalent to ₩216.283 trillion or US$191.329 billion in 2017)^[1]. Shinhan Bank is the main subsidiary of Shinhan Financial Group (SFG). (Full article...)
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The Agricultural Bank of China (ABC), also known as AgBank, is a Chinese partially state-owned multinational banking and financial services corporation headquartered in Beijing, China. It is one of the "big four" banks in China, and the second largest bank in the world by total assets, behind the Industrial and Commercial Bank of China. ABC was founded on 10 July 1951, and has its headquarters in Dongcheng District, Beijing. It has branches throughout mainland China, Hong Kong, London, Tokyo, New York, Frankfurt, Sydney, Seoul, and Singapore.

ABC has 320 million retail customers, 2.7 million corporate clients, and nearly 24,000 branches. It is China's third-largest lender by assets. ABC went public in mid-2010, fetching the world's biggest ever initial public offering (IPO) at the time, since overtaken by the Saudi Arabian state-run petroleum enterprise, Saudi Aramco. In 2011, it ranked eighth among the Top 1000 World Banks, by 2015, it ranked third in Forbes' 13th annual Global 2000 list and in 2017 it ranked fifth. In 2023, Agricultural Bank of China was ranked #4 in Forbes' Global 2000 (World's Largest Public Companies). It is considered a systemically important bank by the Financial Stability Board. (Full article...)

Did you know...

... that the Bank of Korea asked the makers of a cheese-filled waffle to change its design?
... that to raise funds for the Council of District Dumas, its chairman led an armed squad to storm the Moscow headquarters of the State Bank?

Related portals

Selected images

Image 1An interior of a branch of National Westminster Bank on Castle Street, Liverpool (from Bank)
Image 2Former branch in Oulu (from Bank of Finland)
Image 3Large door to an old bank vault. (from Bank)
Image 4Sederholm House [fi] in Helsinki, the Bank's seat from 1819 to 1824 (from Bank of Finland)
Image 5Citibank, The People's Trust Company Building, Brooklyn, New York City. (from Bank)
Image 6Former branch in Viipuri, now Vyborg, Russia (from Bank of Finland)
Image 7National Copper Bank, Salt Lake City 1911 (from Bank)
Image 8Interior of the Helsinki Branch of the Vyborg-Bank [fi] in the 1910s (from Bank)
Image 9The Bank's current head office completed in 1883, with statue of J.V. Snellman by sculptor Emil Wikström in front (from Bank of Finland)
Image 10A former building society, now a modern retail bank in Leeds, West Yorkshire. (from Bank)
Image 11Helsinki head office extension designed by Harry W. Schreck [fi] in the late 1950s (from Bank of Finland)
Image 12This 15th-century painting depicts money-dealers at a banca (bench) during the Cleansing of the Temple. (from Bank)
Image 13Bank of Finland strong box which moved to Helsinki with the bank when it relocated from Turku (from Bank of Finland)
Image 14Safra National Bank, New York (from Bank)
Image 15Carved sign for The Standard Bank of Canada, in Brechin, Ontario. (from Standard Bank of Canada)
Image 16Global headquarters of the Bank for International Settlements in Basel (from Bank)
Image 17SEB main building in Tallinn, Estonia (from Bank)
Image 18An office of Nordea bank in Mariehamn, Åland (from Bank)
Image 19The HSBC Canada Building in Vancouver housed the headquarters for HSBC's Canadian subsidiary (from HSBC Bank Canada)
Image 20Former branch in Turku (from Bank of Finland)
Image 21Former branch [fi] in Tampere (from Bank of Finland)
Image 22A Banco do Brasil office in São Paulo, Brazil, the bank is the largest financial institution in Brazil and Latin America. (from Bank)
Image 23Statesman Jan van den Brink was instrumental in the merger of Amsterdamsche Bank and Rotterdamsche Bank in 1964, and remained on the bank's board until 1978 (from AMRO Bank)
Image 24Branch of Nepal Bank in Pokhara, Western Nepal. (from Bank)
Image 25Government Palace in Helsinki, the Bank's home from 1824 until relocation to its current building in 1883 (from Bank of Finland)
Image 26Standard 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. (from Standard Bank of Canada)
Image 27Former branch in Kotka (from Bank of Finland)
Image 28Former branch in Sortavala, now in Russia (from Bank of Finland)
Image 29The 1909 Standard Bank Building at King and Jordan in Toronto, designed by Darling and Pearson. (from Standard Bank of Canada)
Image 30Sealing of the Bank of England Charter (1694), by Lady Jane Lindsay, 1905. (from Bank)
Image 31The BANK of Greenland, Nuuk (from Bank)
Image 32An HSBC Bank Canada branch in Richmond Hill, Ontario, 2014 (from HSBC Bank Canada)
Image 33Beethovenstraat branch in Amsterdam, 1970 (from AMRO Bank)
Image 34Rotterdam head office [nl], later repurposed as a shopping center (from AMRO Bank)
Image 35An American bank in Maryland. (from Bank)
Image 36Suburban bank branch (from Bank)
Image 37OTP Bank in Prešov (Slovakia) (from Bank)
Image 38Amsterdam head office before 1987, lately headquarters of Booking.com (from AMRO Bank)
Image 39An illustration of Northern National Bank as advertized in a 1921 book highlighting the opportunities available in Toledo, Ohio (from Bank)
Image 40The bank's 1890 head office, designed by Richard Alfred Waite. It was demolished in 1928 to make way for the bank's new headquarters. (from Canadian Bank of Commerce)
Image 41National Bank of the Republic, Salt Lake City 1908 (from Bank)
Image 42An HSBC Bank Canada branch in Toronto, 2008 (from HSBC Bank Canada)
Image 43Banco de Venezuela in Coro. (from Bank)
Image 44ATM Al-Rajhi Bank (from Bank)
Image 45Commerce Tower in Montreal, designed by Peter Dickinson, was begun for the Bank of Commerce but was not completed until after the merger with the Imperial Bank. (from Canadian Bank of Commerce)
Image 46From 1867 to 1890 the bank was headquartered at 59 Yonge Street. This was the 1852 Ross, Mitchell & Co. Building, designed by William Thomas. (from Canadian Bank of Commerce)
Image 47Branch of the Standard Bank of Canada in Markham, Ontario, shown in 1912. (from Standard Bank of Canada)

In the news

29 May 2025 – Economy of South Korea: South Korea’s central bank cuts its key interest rate by a quarter percentage point to 2.5%, marking its fourth cut since October, and sharply lowered its 2025 growth forecast to 0.8%, nearly halving the previous projection of 1.5% announced in February after a monetary policy meeting. Share prices rise following the report, with the Kospi gaining 1.7%. (AP)
29 May 2025 – Corruption in Slovakia: Slovakia’s central bank chief, Peter Kažimír, a member of the European Central Bank committee, is convicted of bribery and fined 200,000 euros. The verdict was issued by Judge Milan Cisarik at the Special Criminal Court in Pezinok. (AP)