State Bank of the Russian Empire

The State Bank of the Russian Empire (Russian: Государственный банк Российской Империи) was the dominant financial institution of the Russian Empire from its founding in 1860 until the Empire's end in 1917.

A public bank headquartered in Saint Petersburg, it initially coexisted within the Empire with the Bank Polski until the latter was deprived of its residual monetary role in 1870, and with the Bank of Finland which soon defined a separate monetary zone for the Finnish markka. In 1897, with the Russian adoption of the gold standard, the State Bank fully took the attributes of a central bank, while keeping a significant additional role of commercial and development lending that made it the main source of credit to the Russian economy.^[1]: 882

During the Russian Revolution, the State Bank forcibly absorbed the former business of all Russia's private-sector banks, was renamed People's Bank (Russian: Народный банк), then was liquidated in January 1920. After an extended gap during the era of war communism, it was eventually revived in Russia as the Soviet Gosbank in October 1921, whereas other organizations took central banking roles in newly independent Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania, and Poland, as well as Bessarabia within Greater Romania.