Hamburg bank
The Hamburger Bank , founded in 1619, was a credit institute that acted as an exchange office , giro bank and credit bank on a silver basis for the local merchants .
history
The bank existed from March 2, 1619 to December 31, 1875. It was founded by the City Council of Hamburg.
After lengthy negotiations between the council and the citizenship , it was decided in February 1619 to found the Hamburg bank. Like its model, the Amsterdamsche Wisselbank , which was founded in 1609, it was intended to improve monetary stability in times of currency uncertainty and to simplify trade among merchants. The English merchant adventurers , Portuguese Sephardim and Dutch religious refugees, who were living in Hamburg in large numbers at that time , brought large amounts of their capital and knowledge into the bank, so that the establishment was successful.
The bank was administered free of charge by 2 senators, 2 senior elders , 2 finance citizens and 5 banco citizens (citizens who had their account at the bank). Their premises were in the town hall. An account set up at the bank, initially an amount of at least 400 had Mark Luebeck are paid. In addition, regulations were issued that generally prohibited bills of exchange for and private trade in precious metals , and instructions and bills of exchange over 400 Marks in Luebisch were only allowed to be processed through the Hamburg bank.
On November 20, 1619, Lehnbanco , a lending bank, was also founded as a department of the Hamburg bank . This gave merchants, especially the city of Hamburg itself, a loan against a deposit . The Hamburg bank was also assigned the municipal mint and the grain magazine, but these settled independently of each other. From 1725 to 1736 the Courantbank was set up as a subdivision of the Hamburger Bank, which was supposed to counteract the massive deterioration of the currency at the time. Courant is the old name for Kurant and refers to coins that are covered by their precious metal content.
Mark Banco
The deposits, i.e. coins of various types and precious metals , which the merchants paid in, were recorded in the bank's books in bancotalers , later as Mark Banco . At the Hamburg bank founded in 1619, the bank total corresponded to the fine silver weight of the Reichstaler according to the Reichsmünzfuß of 1566. The Mark Banco was purely an accounting currency , which means it was not issued and only existed in the bank's books. In 1622 a Mark Banco corresponded to a silver weight of 8.66 g. The bank accepted silver bars at a rate of 59 1/3 Banco marks per inch pound and credited them to the depositor on his folium (account). From this he could make cashless payments to other account holders by writing and writing. The Mark Banco was divided into 16 shillings of 12 pfennigs each. Since the Mark Banco represented a stable value, it was used as currency in wholesaling and mortgage loans , and the merchants also kept their books in Mark Banco. In addition, the rates for other currencies and goods were published regularly. Later, a mark was also minted in Hamburg , which was called the Mark Courant and whose value was different from the Mark Banco.
The bank weathered many serious crises more or less successfully, with unsecured loans in particular being a serious problem. In 1770 the bank was successfully reformed.
During the French era in Hamburg , almost the entire bank was looted, and the bank was also hit hard by the accompanying economic crisis, but the company was continued. It was not until the merger to form the German Empire and the associated currency unification that the Hamburger Bank was closed in 1875 and converted into a branch of the Reichsbank . As a small concession to Hamburg - and because northern and southern German states could not choose between guilder and taler currency - the new currency system also became a market system.
See also
literature
- Manfred Pohl: Hamburg banking history. v. Hase & Koehler Verlag, Mainz 1986, ISBN 3-7758-1136-2 , pp. 19-28.
Individual evidence
- ↑ a b Manfred Pohl: Hamburger Bankgeschichte , 1986, p. 21.
- ^ Heinrich August Pierer (Ed.): Universal Lexicon of the Present and the Past. Volume 3, 2nd edition, Altenburg 1840, p. 377 ( books.google.de ).
- ↑ Manfred Pohl: Hamburger Bankgeschichte , 1986, p. 22.
- ^ R Siegfried, Die Börsen-Papiere, Part 1: The Stock Exchange and the Stock Exchange History , 1874, p. 75