[9][4]: 199 The Reichsbank was technically a private-sector company with individual shareholders, albeit not in joint-stock form, and operated from the start under the close control of the Reich government.

[6]: 42  The shareholders were represented in a central committee (German: Zentralausschuss) of 15 members, which met at least every month under the chairmanship of the Reichsbank's president and could scrutinize the management but not change it or influence policy decision.

In 1909, an amendment to the Banking Act of 1875 made the Rischsbank's notes legal tender and redeemable at the rate of 2790 Marks per kilogram of gold.

Following Germany's defeat and the 1919 Treaty of Versailles, the German government was unable to meet its expenditures and commitments by taxation and borrowing from external sources, and instead turned to the Reichsbank for monetary financing.

Combined with its reaction to the occupation of the Ruhr by France and Belgium, this triggered a dramatic episode of hyperinflation that rendered the Mark practically worthless.

[12]: 17-18  By decree of 15 October 1923 on the initiative of finance minister Hans Luther, the government created a separate bank, the Deutsche Rentenbank, endowed with the right to issue notes (German: Rentenbankscheine) redeemable in a kind of non-interest-bearing mortgage bond, the Rentenbrief, denominated in gold Mark and theoretically backed by a collective mortgage debt imposed upon German agriculture and industry.

That confidence-building initiative succeeded against all expectations, even though the Rentenbankscheine only had the status of "legally-admitted medium of exchange" while the Reichsbank's devalued paper notes remained legal tender.

The General Council also elected one of its foreign members to serve as Currency Commissioner (German: Komissar für die Notenausgabe) supervising note issuance.

The General Council was reduced to 10 members, all German, and the role of Currency Commissioner went to the President of the Rechnungshof des Deutschen Reiches [de].

[12]: 22 The Nazi regime promptly put an end to the independence of the Reichsbank and made it an instrument of their policy of directing Germany's resources towards rearmament and military expansion.

By amendment of 27 October 1933 to the Banking Law, the General Council was abolished and the Direktorium, including the President, were henceforth to be directly appointed and dismissed by the Führer.

Another law of 15 June 1939 stipulated that the President and Direktorium should directly receive their instructions from the Führer, and renamed the bank as Deutsche Reichsbank.

[12]: 33  During most of the Nazi period the same individual was President of the Reichsbank and Minister of the Economy, namely Hjalmar Schacht from August 1934 to November 1937 and Walther Funk from January 1939 to May 1945.

In April and May 1945, the remaining reserves of the Reichsbank – gold (730 bars), cash (6 large sacks), and precious stones and metals such as platinum (25 sealed boxes) – were dispatched by Walther Funk to be buried on the Klausenhof Mountain at Einsiedl in Bavaria, where the final German resistance was to be concentrated.

[13] Funk would be tried and convicted of war crimes at the Nuremberg trials, not least for receiving money and goods stolen from Jewish and other victims of the Nazi concentration camps.

[citation needed] The explanation of the disappearance of the Reichsbank reserves in 1945 was uncovered by Bill Stanley Moss and Andrew Kennedy, in post-war Germany.

Thus, Land central banks (German: Landeszentralbanken) were created on 1 January 1947 in American-occupied Munich (for Bavaria), Stuttgart (for Württemberg-Baden), and Wiesbaden (for Hesse), followed in March by French-occupied Tübingen (for Württemberg-Hohenzollern), Freiburg im Breisgau (for South Baden, and Mainz (for Rhineland-Palatinate), then American-occupied Bremen on 1 April 1947, and eventually British-occupied Düsseldorf (for North Rhine-Westphalia), Hanover (for Lower Saxony), Kiel (for Schleswig-Holstein) and Hamburg by the Spring of 1948.

[14]: 335 In 1947, newly appointed U.S. Military Governor Lucius D. Clay decided, against directives from Washington, that Germany needed a central bank instead of a mere board bringing together the Landeszentralbanken for joint policy decisions.

In 1955, a Federal German Law allowed holders of Reichsbank common stock to exchange it for interim certificates of the Bank Deutscher Länder.

While the main building was heavily damaged during World War II and eventually demolished in 1960, the 1930s extension survives as the Haus am Werderschen Markt, hosting the German Federal Foreign Office after having been the home of the Socialist Unity Party of Germany in the 1960s, 1970s and 1980s.