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Poland Banking and Finance
In the reform programs of the early 1990s, major
restructuring of Poland's financial infrastructure was a
top
priority in order to achieve more efficient movement of
money
through the domestic economy and to provide a secure
environment
for the foreign investment that was expected to carry
Poland
through its postcommunist economic slump.
The State Banking System
A highly concentrated state banking monopoly was a
typical
feature of East European economies in the communist
period. In
Poland the monopoly was composed of the National Bank of
Poland
(Narodowy Bank Polski--NBP), which had replaced the prewar
Western-style Bank of Poland in 1945; the Commercial Bank
(Bank
Handlowy--BH), which had a monopoly in financing foreign
trade;
the Polish Savings Office, which controlled transactions
with
private international transfers; and about 1,600 small
regional
and specialized cooperative banks that jointly formed the
Bank of
Food Economy. To encourage private savings, a specialized
savings
bank, the General Savings Office, was established in 1987
by
detaching designated departments from the NBP. In 1988
nine
state-owned commercial banks were formed from regional
branches
of the NBP, and a state Export Development Bank was
established.
Legislation was introduced in 1989 to allow private
individuals, both Poles and foreigners, to form banks as
limited
stock companies. Between 1989 and 1991, a total of seventy
licenses was issued to private banks, including seven
banks
funded by foreign capital, two cooperative banks, and
three
branches of foreign banks. In October 1991, privatization
of the
Export Development Bank began, and the nine state
commercial
banks (which until that time still operated as they had
under the
old NBP) were transformed into limited stock companies.
The State
Treasury owned and operated the banks for an intermediate
period
while they prepared for privatization.
Data as of October 1992
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