[6] After 2017 CEC began a protracted modernization process and as of January 2024, it had grown back to third-largest bank in Romania.

[7] CEC was founded in 1864—five years after the union of the two Danubian Principalities, and more than a decade before the Romanian state as such—as the Casa de Depuneri și Consemnațiuni[4] (literally "Deposits and Consignments House"[8] but effectively "Deposits and Consignments Bank": the Romanian casa is used analogously to the French caisse; both are related to the English cash.

[citation needed]) In 1880, the name was changed to Casa de Depuneri, Consemnațiuni și Economie[4] ("Deposits, Consignments and Savings House").

[2][9] In Communist Romania, CEC the main retail institution collecting household deposits and placing them into government-issued assets while being also involved in housing finance, similarly as DSK in Bulgaria, OTP in Hungary, and PKO in Poland.

After the 1989 revolution, CEC began activities such as granting loans to other banks and dealing in government securities.