BPS Group, for Bank Polskiej Spółdzielczości (lit. 'Polish Cooperative Bank'), is a Polish cooperative banking group, relying on the central financing entity Bank BPS.
The BPS Group originates from a 2002 merger between six institutions of the Polish cooperative banking sector led by Gospodarczy Bank Południowo-Zachodni (GBPZ, lit. 'southwestern commercial bank'), established in 1992 in Wrocław.[1] Its aggregate assets at end-2023 reached 149 billion Polish złotys.
Overview
In the early 2000s, GBPZ formed an alliance with five other regional banks,[2] then merged with them on 2002-3-15 and renamed itself as Bank BPS.[3][4] The new entity thus became the central entity of a group that brought together 369 (61 percent) of the 604 local cooperative banks that remained in Poland at that time as a result of ongoing consolidation.[5] Since then, the group has kept dual head offices in Wrocław and Warsaw.[1]
In 2015, the Polish Financial Supervision Authority approved the institutional protection scheme of the BPS Group, which brings together Bank BPS and the local cooperative banks. Bank BPS, in turn, is majority-owned by the group's local cooperative banks. As of mid-2025, there were 307 local cooperative banks in the group.[6]
Paweł Siano was the initiator of the formation of the BPS group. He led GBPZ from its creation in 1992, then BPS Bank until 2008.[3]
See also
- Cooperative banking in Poland
- List of banks in Poland
- List of European cooperative banks
References
- O nas Bank BPS, retrieved 2025-7-29^
- Pokojska Małgorzata. Drogi się rozchodzą Gazeta Bankowa, 2001^
- Czesława Kosturek. Historia banków spółdzielczych w ostatnim ćwierćwieczu bs.net.pl, 2015-3-14^