The NBS Archives are open to the public at the following times:
Tuesday, Wednesday and Thursday
9 a.m. to 12 noon /
12:45 p.m. to 3 p.m.
In July, August and September the Archives are closed to the public.
The Archives will be closed on 18 and 25 February 2025.
Obchodná banka, Banská Bystrica
The bank was established on 15 May 1904 under the Hungarian name Beszterczebányai kereskedelmi bank, r. t. The share capital was 200,000 Austro-Hungarian crowns (K) raised from 209 shareholders. The first management elected by the general meeting consisted of Mano Tandlich as chairman of the board of directors, Filip Kohn as the vice-chairman of the board of directors and Armín Krausz as the managing director; the board members were Samuel Engel, Samuel Porgesz, Tivadar Frankl, Miksa Reisz, Albert Hexner, Samuel Schwarz, Armín Telek and Ödön Turcsányi; the chairman of the supervisory board was Manó Lenke and the other members were Alajoš Fischer and Jozef Fleissig.
By 1906 the bank made a profit of K 7,000 and it acquired deposits of K 425,000. The share capital was raised to K 400,000 in 1909 and K 1 million in 1917. At the end of 1918 it had a profit of nearly K 80,000 and deposits of just over K 4 million.
As it had been an active investor in war loans, it suffered substantial losses at the end of the war. The share capital was reduced by half in 1919. Milan Kulišek, Bertalan Gescheidt and Ľudevít Kovács were added to the bank’s board of directors and Armín Krausz became its managing director.
In 1922 the bank signed a syndicate agreement with Národná banka (National Bank) in Banská Bystrica and the share capital was increased to 2 million Czechoslovak crowns. The bank’s annual reports and notices were published in the Pohronský hlásnik newspaper in Banská Bystrica. The bank provided loans to merchants, crafts workers and farmers. Deposits grew until 1930 and after that only decreased, as did profits. On 24 July 1939, the bank proposed a merger with Národná banka in Banská Bystrica based on the agreement concluded in 1922. Finally, after receiving approval from the Ministry of Finance, the general meeting of Obchodná banka (Commercial Bank) approved the merger with Národná banka in Banská Bystrica on 22 May 1940, which was renamed Stredoslovenská banka (Bank of Central Slovakia), effective from 1 January 1940. The general meeting of Stredoslovenská banka approved the merger on 6 June 1940, with retroactive effect from 1 January 1940.
The archival documents were initially entered in the corporate archives of Štátna banka československá (State Bank of Czechoslovakia) in Ružomberok. After 1990, the complete fonds was deposited in the archives of Národná banka Slovenska at 27 Krajná Street in Bratislava and it was moved to its archive building at 8 Cukrová Street in Bratislava in 2003. An inventory of the fonds was made in 1968 and revised in 2016. The fonds consists mainly of minutes from meetings of the board of directors and account ledgers.
Last updated: Monday, November 18, 2024