Azovsko-Donskoy Commercial Bank

Categories / Economy/Finances and Credit
AZOVSKO-DONSKOY BANK, a joint-stock commercial bank opened in Taganrog in 1871 for financing trade and granting loans. Its share capital amounted to 5 million roubles in 1871; it became the largest bank in the country by the mid-1890s and one of the five largest national banks by the end of the 1890s. The management moved to St. Petersburg in 1903. B. A. Kamenka served as the managing director and president of the Bank in 1910-17; the heyday of the bank is associated with his activities on these posts. M. M. Fedorov, the former minister of trade and industry, served as Chairman of the Board. Along with financing trade, the bank took control over enterprises fighting the industrial crisis in the early 1900s and reorganised them into new joint-stock companies. As a result, the bank controlled over 90 companies by 1917, its position was especially strong in ferrous and non-ferrous metallurgy, coal industry, and production of building materials. The share capital rose from 20 to 50 million roubles in 1909-14, while investments and current liabilities increased from 84.1 to 211.6 million roubles. The bank had 73 branches in the country; its shares were quoted on the Berlin Exchange from 1910 and the Paris Exchange from 1911. The bank acquired a large holding of shares from the Nordic Bank, Paris, in 1912-13. It was nationalized on December 14 (27), 1917 as decreed by the Soviet of People's Commissars of the Russian Soviet Federative Socialist Republic. Originally situated at 26 Nevsky Prospect, the bank acquired buildings Nos. 3 and 5 in Bolshaya Morskaya Street in the mid-to-late 1900s to construct its own building according to the project by architect F. I. Lidval and artist V. V. Kuznetsov in 1907-09 and 1912-13, a striking example of Neoclassicism. The left part of the building has a large six-column portico between the 1st floor and the 3d floor, its facades are decorated with bas-reliefs.

References: Бовыкин В. И., Петров Ю. А. Коммерческие банки Российской империи. М., 1994. С. 125-133.

O. A. Kubitskaya. Fedorov Mikhail Mikhailovich
Kamenka Boris Abramovich
Kuznetsov Vasily Vasilievich
Lidval Fedor (Iogan Friedrich) Ivanovich
Bolshaya Morskaya St./Saint Petersburg, city, house 5
Bolshaya Morskaya St./Saint Petersburg, city, house 3
Nevsky prospect/Saint Petersburg, city, house 26
Петров Ю. А., Бовыкин В. И. Коммерческие банки Российской империи. М., 1994