The Banque de Tunisie (lit. 'Bank of Tunisia') is a bank in Tunisia, the first established in the country in modern times.[1] It has been listed in the Bourse de Tunis since 1990.[2][3]
History
The Banque de Tunisie was created on 1884/09/23 by the Banque Transatlantique which converted its existing Tunis office into a fully-fledged local bank, three years after the establishment of the French protectorate of Tunisia. Its seat was a diminutive building at 3, rue Es-Sadikia (now rue Gamal Abdel Nasser), across the street from the French protectorate residence,[4] which has since been demolished. Its founders hoped to secure the exclusive right to issue banknotes in the protectorate from the French government, which however was eventually granted to the Banque de l'Algérie in 1904.
In 1911, the Banque de Tunisie participated alongside the Banque Transatlantique in the creation of the Banque Commerciale du Maroc, headquartered in Paris and with main office in Casablanca. In 1941, it was acquired together with Banque Transatlantique by the Crédit Industriel et Commercial (CIC), which took advantage of the Vichy anti-Jewish legislation. In 1948, it absorbed the Tunis branch of the Banque italo-française de crédit, and in 1951 led the liquidation of the Tunis-based Banca italiana di credito, both of which had primarily served Italian Tunisian customers.
By the time of Tunisian independence in 1956, the CIC agreed to cede most of its 70% equity stake in Banque de Tunisie to the country's government; at that time, most of the bank's staff were Jewish, as were about a third of its depositors.
See also
External links
References
- Nicolas Stoskopf. Dictionnaire historique des banques du groupe CIC Éditions La Branche, 2009^
- Oxford Business Group, Tunisia, 2009 (Report), June 19, 2009^
- Bourse de Tunis^