In banking, the term national bank carries several meanings:
- especially in developing countries, a bank owned by the state
- an ordinary private bank which operates nationally (as opposed to regionally or locally or even internationally)
- in the United States, an ordinary private bank operating within a specific regulatory structure, which may or may not operate nationally, under the supervision of the Office of the Comptroller of the Currency.
In the past, the term "national bank" has been used synonymously with "central bank", but it is no longer used in this sense today. Some central banks may have the words "National Bank" in their name; conversely if a bank is named in this way, it is not automatically considered a central bank. For example, National-Bank AG in Essen, Germany is a privately owned commercial bank, just like National Bank of Canada of Montreal, Canada. On the other side, National Bank of Ethiopia is the central bank of Ethiopia and National Bank of Cambodia is the central bank of Cambodia.
Read more about National Bank: Afghanistan, Australia, Denmark, Canada, Chile, Colombia, India, Iran, Pakistan, Serbia, United States
Famous quotes containing the words national and/or bank:
“Thinking is the most unhealthy thing in the world, and people die of it just as they die of any other disease. Fortunately, in England at any rate, thought is not catching. Our splendid physique as a people is entirely due to our national stupidity.”
—Oscar Wilde (1854–1900)
“Life is a long Dardenelles, My Dear Madam, the shores whereof are bright with flowers, which we want to pluck, but the bank is too high; & so we float on & on, hoping to come to a landing-place at last—but swoop! we launch into the great sea! Yet the geographers say, even then we must not despair, because across the great sea, however desolate & vacant it may look, lie all Persia & the delicious lands roundabout Damascus.”
—Herman Melville (1819–1891)