The Bank of the Argentine Nation was founded on 18 October 1891 by President Carlos Pellegrini, with the purpose of stabilizing the nation's finances following the Panic of 1890; its first director was Vicente Lorenzo Casares. In its early decades it became a leading financing source for agricultural smallholders, and later for commercial and industrial businesses, as well as handling an array of public sector transactions. The bank's reputation suffered after it was revealed that bribes had been received by the board of directors in 1994 when contacting IBM for the supply of computers, software, and communication equipment, becoming a prominent political scandal at the time.
Services
Long a significant supplier of domestic lending in a credit-tight economy, the bank attempted—with only partial success—to revive the localcredit market during the tenure of Gabriela Ciganotto, who stated the main goal of the bank in her inauguration speech in 2006 as "putting at the service of production, especially small and medium businesses, and not of speculation." the bank ranked 278th in the world in terms of tier one capital according to a global survey of top 1000 world banks carried out by The Banker, a Financial Times publication. Domestically, it has long been Argentina's largest bank; it maintained 626 branches, US$30 billion in deposits, and a loan portfolio of US$15 billion. Its lending profile is less oriented toward consumer or mortgage lending than other leading banks in Argentina; one third of its outstanding credit is to the public sector and 80% of the remainder is allocated to commercial loans. The public bank is giving to the people divers credit such as UVA credit for house mortgage.
Headquarters
The bank's headquarters are located in the San Nicolás neighborhood of Buenos Aires on the site of the Teatro Colón's first building, bought by the national government in 1888 and later designated as main offices of the recently founded institution. The edifice was remodeled in 1910 by architect Adolfo Büttner to better suit its new role as a bank venue. In 1938 architect Alejandro Bustillo presented a new design for a much larger building in a revivalist, French-influenced, Monumental Neoclassical style. These new headquarters were built in two stages between 1940 and 1955. This building is also home to the Alejandro Bustillo Art Gallery, established in 1971, as well as to a historic and numismatic museum.
Branches
the bank maintained 626 branches throughout Argentina, and 15 more overseas, along with a representative office in Porto Alegre, Brazil. It employed 16,519 people in Argentina, and more than 200 abroad.
