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Piraeus Bank

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Piraeus Bank
Native name
Πειραιώς Financial Holdings Α.Ε.[1]
Company typePublic
Athex: TPEIR
ISINGRS014003032[2]
IndustryFinancial services
Founded6 July 1916; 108 years ago (1916-07-06)[1]
Headquarters
Athens
,
Greece[1]
Number of locations
405 branches[3] (2022)
Area served
Key people
[4]
Revenue
  • Increase €2.582 billion (2022)
[5][3]
  • Increase €1.693 billion (2022)
[5][3]
  • Increase €577 million (2022)
[5][3]
AUM
  • Increase €6.938 billion (2022)
[5][3]
Total assets
  • Decrease €75.661 billion (2022)
[5][3]
Total equity
  • Increase €6.581 billion (2022)
[5][3]
Owner
[6]
Number of employees
8,604[3]
Subsidiaries
Capital ratioFully Loaded Common Equity Tier 1 = 11.5% (Fully Loaded Basel III)
Websitewww.piraeusholdings.gr

Piraeus Bank (Greek: Τράπεζα Πειραιώς) is a Greek multinational financial services company with its headquarters in Athens, Greece.[9] Piraeus Bank's shares have been listed on the Athens Stock Exchange (ATHEX) since January 1918.[10]

In Greece, with a 30% market share in loans (34.4 billion) and 29% in deposits (54.6 billion), it is the country's largest bank.[11]

Piraeus has been designated as a Significant Institution since the entry into force of European Banking Supervision in late 2014, and as a consequence is directly supervised by the European Central Bank.[12][13]

Overview

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Piraeus Bank is a universal bank providing various banking services.

Historically a bank supportive of SMEs it now also possesses particular know-how in the areas of agricultural banking, consumer and mortgage credit, green banking, capital markets, investment banking, leasing and electronic banking.[10]

Piraeus Bank and its subsidiaries form the Piraeus Bank Group.[14]

History

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Building in Odesa, Ukraine

A group of shipowners in Piraeus founded Banque du Pirée (Piraeus Bank; BP) in 1916 to finance trade. The bank started trading on the Athens Exchange in 1918.[15] The Greek government bought the bank in 1975 and transformed it into a universal bank. The new headquarters designed by Sir Basil Spence were built on Stadiou Street in the center of Athens. In December 1991 the government privatised the bank, which has grown in size and scope since then.

In 1962, PT joined the Emporiki Bank Group (or Andreadis Group). In On December 5, 1975, PT was nationalised and in 1991, the state privatized PT and the bank changed its name to Piraeus Bank (TP). Michalis Sallas takes over. In 1995 the Group established Piraeus Bank Romania with 160 branches and one year later Tirana Bank, the first privately owned banking institution in Albania with 56 branches. In 1999 with its acquisition of Xiosbank, PB took over Xios's branch in Sofia, Bulgaria; it has now some 83 branches in the country. PB also acquired the small New York-based Marathon National Bank and Interbank N.Y; it merged Interbank into Marathon Bank.

In 1998 the bank absorbed the Greek branch networks of Chase Manhattan Bank, Crédit Lyonnais, and acquired a controlling interest in Macedonia-Thrace Bank. A year later it added in the activities of National Westminster Bank and acquired Xiosbank (Bank of Chios) which it totally absorbed along with Macedonia-Thrace Bank. In 2002 Piraeus Bank signed a strategic alliance with ING Group (bancassurance). In 2005 it acquired the Bulgarian Eurobank, Atlas Bank in Serbia, Egyptian Commercial Bank in Egypt. In 2007 it expanded in Ukraine by acquiring the International Commerce Bank (renamed as Piraeus Bank ICB) and established Piraeus Bank Cyprus with the acquisition of Arab Bank Cyprus.

In 2002 the bank absorbed 58% of ETBA Bank (Hellenic Industrial Development Bank). PB also started a strategic alliance with ING Group, which took a 5% stake in the Piraeus Bank. In 2006 the PB sold back to ING its stake in a jointly owned mutual funds company. Cooperation continues via the bank-assurance company ING-PIRAEUS.

In 2005 Piraeus Bank acquired the Belgrade-based Atlas banka in Serbia (today Piraeus Bank Beograd with 42 branches), and the Egyptian Commercial Bank (today Piraeus Bank Egypt with 43).

In 2007 PB purchased the Cyprus arm of Arab Bank and renamed it Piraeus Bank (Cyprus).[16] On 13 September 2007 Piraeus Bank completed its acquisition of 99.6% of the share capital of International Commercial Bank in Ukraine, today named Piraeus ICB.

Within the European debt crisis, Piraeus Bank has been subject to the Greek austerity packages: the Hellenic Financial Stability Fund became its main stock holder since 2012 and remained such as of 2020.

In 2011, according to reports in July 2012, the bank obscured its real access to capital by providing circular loans to finance purchase of its own stock through undeclared offshore companies.[17]

In 2012, Piraeus Bank took part in the restructuring of the Greek banks, gaining a leading position in the Greek banking sector.

  • In June 2012 Piraeus Bank sold its shares in Marathon Banking Corporation (New York City) to Investors Bancorp. The capital was used to finance the take over of the Greek banks Geniki Bank and healthy parts of ATEbank.
  • In 2012 it acquired the so-called 'good' part of Agricultural Bank.
  • In December 2012 it acquired Societe Generale's Geniki Bank.[18]

In 2013, Piraeus Bank was considered as having sufficient capital and was included in the group of 4 systemic banks which would be coordinated by the Hellenic Financial Stability Fund to absorb undercapitalised banks.[19] It would reach an international presence consisting of 370 branches focusing in Southeastern Europe and the Eastern Mediterranean as of 2014.[10]

After a probe by the European Commission over government bailouts following the Greek government-debt crisis, in July 2014 restructuring plans for the bank were approved.[20] In November 2015 the European Commission approved amended restructuring plans for Alpha Bank and Eurobank and then for Piraeus Bank on 29 November 2015, allowing a new injection of €2.72 billion of public funds via the Hellenic Financial Stability Fund.[21]

In the following years, Piraeus Bank proceeded to divest abroad.

As of June 2019, the Hellenic Financial Stability Fund held 26% of outstanding common shares,[28] while the remaining 74% was held by the private sector (legal entities and individuals).[29]

HFSF had the option to €2 billion of perpetual bonds into Piraeus Bank shares in December 2022.[28] As of November 2020, the total market capitalization of the bank was less than €500 million. The conversion was triggered in November 2020, giving HFSF a further 35% share of the bank,[30] worth less than 200 million euro, a paper loss of over 1.5 billion euro.[31]

In March 2024, the Hellenic Financial Stability Fund sold its entire 27 percent stake in Piraeus Bank, thus fully privatising the bank and raising 1.35 billion euros.[32]

Head Office

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The head office of Piraeus Bank in Athens was originally erected in the 1930s for the Pension Fund of the Greek Army (Greek: Μετοχικό Ταμείο Στρατού), which still owns it and leases it to the bank.[33]

Controversy

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Data Protection Fine

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In May 2023, Piraeus Bank was fined €210k by the Greek Data Protection Supervisory Authority for unlawful processing of personal data and failure to respond to a request for information. This information is supported by a reference provided by the GDPR Fine Tracker Portal[34]

See also

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References

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  1. ^ a b c "Στοιχεία Δημοσιότητας". Business Registry (in Greek). Union of Hellenic Chambers Of Commerce. Retrieved 23 January 2023.
  2. ^ "Profile". Athens Exchange Group. Retrieved 23 January 2023.
  3. ^ a b c d e f g h "PIRAEUS FINANCIAL HOLDINGS PRESS RELEASE Full Year 2022 Financial Results" (PDF). Piraeus Financial Holdings. Retrieved 24 February 2023.
  4. ^ "Board Members". Piraeus Financial Holdings. Retrieved 23 January 2023.
  5. ^ a b c d e f "FY 2022 DATA OF PIRAEUS FINANCIAL HOLDINGS". Piraeus Financial Holdings. Retrieved 24 February 2023.
  6. ^ "Shareholding Structure". Piraeus Financial Holdings. Retrieved 23 January 2023.
  7. ^ "MIG - Company". Athens Exchange Group. Retrieved 1 December 2023.
  8. ^ a b c d "9Μ Condensed Interim Consolidated Financial Statements" (PDF). Piraeus Financial Holdings. Piraeus Financial Holdings. Retrieved 1 December 2023.
  9. ^ "TPEIR Profile & Executives - Piraeus Bank SA - Bloomberg". bloomberg.com. Retrieved 28 November 2012.
  10. ^ a b c Group, Piraeus Bank. "Corporate Profile - Piraeus Bank". www.piraeusbankgroup.com. Retrieved 17 August 2017. {{cite web}}: |last= has generic name (help)
  11. ^ "Περιγραφή Ομίλου | Πειραιώς Financial Holdings". Retrieved 23 July 2022.
  12. ^ "The list of significant supervised entities and the list of less significant institutions" (PDF). European Central Bank. 4 September 2014.
  13. ^ "List of supervised entities" (PDF). European Central Bank. 1 January 2023.
  14. ^ "General information about the Group". Retrieved 25 November 2013.
  15. ^ TPEIR: profile.helex.gr
  16. ^ "Greek Bank of Piraeus to buy Arab Bank network in Cyprus for 15 mln eur". Hemscott. 10 December 2007. Retrieved 2007-12-11.
  17. ^ Baker, Luke (2012-07-23). "EU says mismanaged Greek banks face "revamp"". Reuters. Archived from the original on June 23, 2020. Retrieved 2020-03-07. Michael Sallas, and his children had taken out loans of more than 100 million euros to secretly buy shares representing an undeclared family stake in the bank of more than 6 percent. The purchases, conducted as part of an 800-million-euro (624.16 billion pounds) Piraeus rights issue in January 2011 designed to strengthen the bank's capital base, were made via offshore companies owned by Sallas and his two children
  18. ^ Papadoyiannis, Yiannis (28 May 2014). "Absorption of Geniki makes financial sense for Piraeus group". ekathimerini.com. Retrieved 25 January 2016.
  19. ^ Green, Elaine (24 September 2013). "Greek Banking No Longer Lost At Sea?". Forbes. Retrieved 21 February 2015.
  20. ^ "Restructuring of two Greek banks approved by EU". Greek Herald. Archived from the original on 28 July 2014. Retrieved 23 July 2014.
  21. ^ "State aid: Commission approves aid for Piraeus Bank on the basis of an amended restructuring plan". European Commission. 2015-11-29.
  22. ^ "The market is beginning to recognize us as a bank that is looking to lend". The Business Report. 27 September 2017. Retrieved 27 September 2017.
  23. ^ "Piraeus Bank agrees to sell Serbian operations to Direktna Bank". Reuters. Retrieved 2018-03-28.
  24. ^ "Direktna Banka buys Piraeus Bank's Serbian unit". balkaneu.com. Retrieved 2018-03-28.
  25. ^ Marica, Irina (2017-12-22). "Greek group Piraeus sells Romanian subsidiary to J. C. Flowers". Romania Insider. Retrieved 2018-03-28.
  26. ^ "Piraeus Bank Agrees the Sale of Piraeus Bank Romania". Yahoo! Finance. Retrieved 2018-03-28.
  27. ^ "Serbian Direktna Banka completes acquisition of Piraeus Bank Beograd". Central European Financial Observer. Retrieved October 10, 2019.
  28. ^ a b Hellenic Financial Stability Fund (November 2019). "Interim Statement of Financial Position of the Hellenic Financial Stability Fund, as of 30 June 2019" (PDF). Archived from the original (PDF) on 21 June 2020. Retrieved 8 March 2020.
  29. ^ "Piraeus bank shareholder structure/ 4-traders.com". 4-traders.com. Retrieved 2018-08-03.
  30. ^ "Cancellation of the CoCo coupon payment". athexgroup.gr. 2020-11-23.
  31. ^ "Greece had a plan for its banks. Then the coronavirus struck". POLITICO. 2020-11-27. Retrieved 2020-11-30.
  32. ^ "Piraeus Bank stake sale fetches €1.35 bln". ekathimerini.com. 8 March 2024.
  33. ^ "Ακίνητα". Μετοχικό Ταμείο Στρατού.
  34. ^ "210.000 Euro fine against Piraeus Bank SA".
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Media related to Piraeus Bank at Wikimedia Commons

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