Istituto Bancario San Paolo di Torino S.p.A., commonly known as just San Paolo, was an Italian bank. It was headquartered in Turin, Piedmont. The bank is the predecessor of

Sanpaolo IMI Sanpaolo IMI S.p.A. was an Italian banking and insurance conglomerate, based in Turin. It employed about 44,000 people and had about 7 million customers. On 24 August 2006 a merger with Banca Intesa was announced, which on 1 December 2006 was ap ...

, as well as the current largest bank in Italy in terms of total assets,

Intesa Sanpaolo Intesa Sanpaolo S.p.A. is an Italian international banking group. It is Italy's largest bank by total assets and the world's 27th largest. It was formed through the merger of Banca Intesa and Sanpaolo IMI in 2007, but has a corporate identity ...

. The former owner of San Paolo bank, Compagnia di San Paolo, still significantly owned Intesa Sanpaolo.

History

The bank was founded by Compagnia di San Paolo (a brotherhood) in 1563. In early years the bank was a

mount of piety A mount of piety is an institutional pawnbroker run as a charity in Europe from Renaissance times until today. Similar institutions were established in the colonies of Catholic countries; the Mexican Nacional Monte de Piedad is still in operatio ...

. In 1991

Crediop Dexia Crediop S.p.A. is an Italian bank specializing in financing public infrastructure. It was part of Dexia Group, as the owner of 70% shares. Banco Popolare, Banca Popolare di Milano and Banca Popolare dell'Emilia Romagna owned 10% each as minor ...

became a subsidiary of the bank, which was sold to

Dexia Dexia N.V./S.A., or the Dexia Group, is a Franco-Belgian financial institution formed in 1996. At its peak in 2010, it had about 35,200 members of staff and a core shareholders' equity of €19.2 billion. In 2008, the bank entered severe ...

in 1999 by

, the successor of the bank. In 1991, due to , the bank was transformed from a statutory corporation to

società per azioni ''Società'' (Italian language, Italian: ''Society'') was an Italian communist cultural magazine published in Italy between 1945 and 1961. History and profile ''Società'' was founded as a quarterly magazine in Florence in 1945. The founders wer ...

(company limited by shares), which San Paolo Bank Holding S.p.A. and Istituto Bancario San Paolo di Torino S.p.A. were created. Compagnia di San Paolo remained as the major shareholders. In 1997 the brotherhood owned 20.54% of the bank, followed by

Banco Santander Banco Santander, S.A., doing business as Santander Group (, , Spanish: ), is a Spanish multinational financial services company based in Madrid and Santander in Spain. Additionally, Santander maintains a presence in all global financial centr ...

(6.8%),

Istituto Mobiliare Italiano Banca IMI is a subsidiary of Intesa Sanpaolo which is specialized in investment banking and capital markets. The bank can trace its origins to the Istituto Mobiliare Italiano. IMI merged with Istituto Bancario San Paolo di Torino to form Sanpaolo ...

(5%) and others. In 1994 the bank absorbed Banca Provinciale Lombarda and Banco Lariano. In 1995 Sanpaolo absorbed Banca Nazionale delle Comunicazioni. According to Ricerche e Studi, a subsidiary of

Mediobanca Mediobanca is an Italian investment bank founded in 1946 at the initiative of Raffaele Mattioli (at that time CEO of Banca Commerciale Italiana, the largest commercial bank in Italy which promoted its incorporation together with Credito Italiano) ...

, the bank was ranked the second in terms of client deposits in 1997, behind

Banca Intesa Banca Intesa S.p.A. was an Italian banking group. It was formed in 1998. In the next year the banking group merged with another bank Banca Commerciale Italiana to become IntesaBCi. However, the name of the group was reverted to Banca Intesa in 2 ...

(pro forma data). In 1998 the bank merged with Istituto Mobiliare Italiano to form

. Former shareholders of Sanpaolo received about 55.3% shares of the new company (or 775,184,948). Compagnia di San Paolo would own 16.4%.

References

{{Authority control Defunct banks of Italy 1563 establishments in Italy Banks established in the 16th century Companies established in the 1560s 1998 disestablishments in Italy Banks disestablished in 1998 * Mounts of piety Banco Santander History of banking