Unico Banking Group

Unico Banking Group

Formation	1977
Headquarters	Brussels
Official language	English
Secretary General	Geert van der Horst
Key people	Wolfgang Kirsch, Chairman of the Unico Board
Website	https://www.unicobankinggroup.eu/

Unico Banking Group is a partnership of eight European co-operative banks founded in 1977.

The group's members are significant players in their respective markets covering a wide range of financial services from retail and corporate banking to investment and merchant banking. The link joining them is a shared co-operative background. Each individual organisation pursues its own strategy domestically and internationally. However, there is a clear desire to co-operate with like-minded financial institutions.

Unico Banking Group members benefit by:

• exchanging strategic views
• offering each other business opportunities
• sharing expertise and experience

The Unico co-operation actively participates in the fields of climate bonds (in close co-operation with the European Investment Bank^[1]) and SME finance.^[2]

History

Unico Banking Group was founded by six co-operative European banks in 1977. In 1997 the Group was formally registered as an EEIG (European Economic Interest Group) and today the group is composed of eight members.^[3]

In the late 1970s, internationalisation of the financial sector began gaining momentum, but Unico members did not at that time have strong networks of their own abroad. They therefore began working together in areas such as payments, the flow of documentation and capital market transaction/syndications. The banks involved also referred customers to one another on occasions when a customer could be better served by a partner bank abroad.

In the past, the idea of intensifying the co-operation within Unico in the form of a European Co-operative Bank was discussed, though this did not happen. An attempted merger between the German DG Bank (now DZ BANK), and Rabobank International in the late 1990s and early 2000 failed. This was largely because of the differences in structures and cultures between the banks.^[4]

Toward the end of the 1990s the Unico Banks developed UniCash,^[5] and Unico Car Lease.^[6] The latter project ended in 2009 when results failed to meet expectations and competition between the members in the different countries increased.

In 2008, at the start of the financial crisis, the Unico banks were the first to resume unsecured lending of up to three months at the London interbank offered rate (Libor) in an effort to kick start interbank lending.^[7]

Overview of the Chairmen of the Unico Banking Group:

Overview of the Secretary Generals of the Unico Banking Group:

Structure

The Unico Banking Group consists of a 12 member Board, an Executive Committee and a standing secretariat located in Brussels.

The standing secretariat coordinates various committees on banking issues. A specific project structure is dedicated to UniCash, the International Cash Management Service, developed by Unico members in co-operation with external parties.

Members

Banco Cooperativo Espagnol l (Spain)

Crédit Agricole S.A. (France)

DZ BANK (Germany)

ICCREA Holding (Italy)

OP Financial Group (Finland)

Rabobank (The Netherlands)

Raiffeisen Bank International (Austria)

Raiffeisen Bank Switzerland

References

External links

• Official website
• http://www.unicash-icm.com