Alpha Bank AE

Alpha Bank has been highly active for almost 140 years. The Bank goes back to the J.F. Costopoulos Commercial Firm, which, shortly after its foundation in 1879, in Kalamata, became involved with banking. 1916 was a landmark year, as John F. Costopoulos, with the collaboration of the Popular Bank, founded the J.F. Costopoulos Bank in the form of a limited partnership, always based in Kalamata. In 1918, it became the Bank of Kalamata that operated as a Public Limited Company.

In 1924, the Bank of Kalamata merged with the banking department of the J.F. Costopoulos commercial firm, thereby creating the Banque de Crédit Commercial Hellénique, which was based in Athens and developed a regional network of branches in Southern Peloponnese. During the years of economic reconstruction that followed the Second World War, the Banque de Crédit Commercial Hellénique, which in 1947 was renamed Commercial Credit Bank, was the only Bank of its scope that was able to overcome the difficult circumstances of that period and develop a national network of branches. Since the 1970s, the Credit Bank, as it was renamed in 1972, had been a leader in the modernisation of the Greek banking system, while after the deregulation of the late 1980s, it had already shaped the profile of a banking Group able to provide a wide range of innovative financial services.

In 1999, Alpha Credit Bank –a name adopted in 1994– acquired 51% of the shares of the Ionian Bank, thus performing the largest privatisation ever carried out in Greece. The merger of the two financial institutions was completed in 2000, while the new, enlarged Bank was named Alpha Bank.