Hamburger Bank

[1] The Hamburg City Council made the decision to create the bank in February 1619, following lengthy negotiations with its civic stakeholders.

[2]: 51  The numerous English merchant adventurers, Portuguese Sephardi Jews and Dutch religious refugees living in Hamburg at the time brought their capital and knowledge to the bank, thus contributing to its initial success.

During the era of Napoleonic rule in Hamburg, the bank was looted and hit hard by economic crisis, but it survived.

The Hamburger Bank ceased to be a stand-alone entity following the Unification of Germany and was converted into a branch of the newly created Reichsbank at the end of 1875.

On the date of the bank's foundation, this Bankothaler corresponded to the fine silver weight of the Reichsthaler based on the Imperial Minting Standard (Reichsmünzfuß) of 1566.

Similar to the Amsterdam Wisselbank, the Hamburger Bank was established in 1619 in order to guarantee the full silver equivalent of the German Empire's Reichsthaler despite the ensuing crises of the Thirty Years' War and the resulting Kipper und Wipper financial crisis.

Silver received from depositors were converted in the books in reichsthalers banco of 3 marks or 48 schillings credited to their accounts (or Folium).