Hansa Bank (Gdansk)
The Hansa-Bank AG was a financial institution in the Free City of Danzig , which the Catholic Church and the Center Party was close to.
founding
The separation of Danzig from the German Reich against the will of the population as a “free city” had brought economic disadvantages in many areas. The banking system, on the other hand, had benefited from the separation: on the one hand, the Gulden, contrary to the Reichsmark, was not affected by hyperinflation . On the other hand, Danzig was the only place outside Poland where Polish zloty could be freely traded. As a result, a number of banks were newly established in Gdansk.
The Catholic Church had to give itself a new structure, as the previous church structures now included areas that had become Polish, that remained in the Reich and that belonged to Danzig. In August 1921, Hansa-Bank AG was founded as the “Center Bank for the Catholic Germans in Danzig”. The name "Freistaat-Bank AG" was originally intended, but this name was not approved by the Senate of the Free City of Danzig . The initial capital was 1,250,000 marks. The chairman of the supervisory board was the long-time chairman of the Center Party of West Prussia and vicar general of the newly formed diocese of Danzig , Anton Sawatzki .
The bank kept the accounts of the Gdańsk parishes , the Apostolic Administration (the later diocese), the Center Party, Catholic associations, many pastors, center members and German-speaking Catholics. The Center Party itself was also a major debtor: the party had been given around 77,000 guilders as a loan from the bank to finance election campaigns.
Crisis and Doom
In 1925, many of the newly founded banks in Gdansk collapsed again. The high unemployment, the German-Polish economic war and the sharp increase in the number of company failures (around 58% of the registered companies under commercial law were in liquidation on October 1, 1925) weighed on the bank's balance sheets.
At the end of 1925, Hansa-Bank was also faced with illiquidity. The payouts of 30,500 guilders due at the beginning of February were not in the cash register. In addition, the bank had suffered extensive losses from loans that the debtors could not repay. Without outside help, the bank was on the verge of collapse.
From the point of view of the Catholic Church, this development came at an extremely bad time: After many years of preparation, Eduard O'Rourke was appointed the first bishop of the new diocese of Danzig on January 2, 1926. 350,000 guilders, which the church had made available as deposits to the bank, were at risk.
The reputation of the Church and the Center Party was also at stake. After the problems became known, O'Rourke instructed Sawatzki in mid-December 1925 to resign from the board of directors in order to loosen the close ties between the bank and the church. Sawatzki remained in office. The director of the bank, Johannes Neumann, who was responsible for the loan defaults, had to leave. He was fired from the board on February 12th. His successor was Max Schmidt.
On January 15, Franz Neubauer ( MP and member of the Gdansk Chamber of Commerce ) and Carl Fuchs (honorary senator) went to the Foreign Office to request liquidity assistance of 150,000 guilders. This request was received with approval. A collapse of the bank would have had a major impact on the position of the center. The center, in turn, was in direct competition with the (also Catholic) Polish party. The AA therefore saw the center "for Germans in Danzig" being important.
On the same day, an auditor was appointed to examine the bank's books. The director of the Prussian State Bank, Prussian Sea Trade , Heinrich Bergemann was selected . In a cursory first examination on January 18, this came to the conclusion that the bank could be saved, but that it immediately needed 50,000 guilders and another 100,000 guilders by February 1st. The bank has been de facto illiquid since January 8th. Only because the bank management managed to put off creditors. 250 customers were waiting for payments due. In a further audit report from January 22nd, Bergemann described the capital requirements for a quiet liquidation with 250,000 guilders and for a restructuring with 500,000 guilders. The bank had written a loss of 220,000 guilders in 1925 and thus consumed the share capital of 200,000 guilders.
Since January 13, 1926, the Reich government had had a cabinet proposal approving aid credits for the Danzig economy in the amount of 10 million Reichsmarks. This draft was extended on January 26th to include the requested help for the Hansa-Bank.
"A collapse of the bank would have the worst political consequences, including foreign policy, for Gdansk Catholicism, especially since a diocese has just been established in Gdansk"
In the cabinet meeting on February 1, the Danzig aid was decided. After another examination by Bergemann, the cabinet decided on February 5 to provide 500,000 Reichsmarks from the hardship fund of the Reich Compensation Office . Bergemann received the order to carry out the renovation.
After the imminent risk of collapse had been averted, Bergemann carried out a detailed examination of the books between March 2 and March 6. The result was that the bank's underfunding increased massively. Instead of negative capital of 300,000 guilders, there was now one of 800,000 guilders. A rescue was now only conceivable if the creditors waived their claims.
On March 5th, 70 creditors met at a creditors' meeting with a total of 500,000 guilders in claims. They agreed to waive 25% of the claims and to extend the claims by one year. A general assembly took place on March 22nd, which approved the restructuring plan.
However, the renovation was unsuccessful. The rough balance of November 30, 1926 showed that hardly any new deposits had been won. The bank failed to regain customer confidence. On January 13, 1927, the Foreign Office therefore decided not to finance any further renovation, but to let the trustee carry out a quiet settlement. The decision led to violent protests in Gdansk, but these had no effect.
The moratorium ended on April 1, 1927 . However, trusting the support of the Reich, there was no bank run . In accordance with a payment plan, the deposits were successively paid back. From April 1931 the bank was officially in liquidation. At the end of 1932 75% of the claims had been repaid, and in October 1935 85%. After the creditors' meeting had formally waived the remaining amount, the bank's final general meeting on March 23, 1936 decided to end the liquidation.
literature
- Stefan Samerski: The Catholic Church in the Free City of Danzig, 1991, ISBN 3-412-01791-4 , pp. 222-237