History
The roots of the Raiffeisen Group history are in Germany. In 1862 social reformer and a mayor of a number of villages in the German Westerwald province Friedrich Wilhelm Raiffeisen on a cooperative basis has founded the first credit union Raiffeisen needed to support the employees during the periods of financial instability and famine. That union has been the prototype of Raiffeisen banks.
Credit unions proposed a wide range of banking services to their members, had been helping people to unify their savings so to give them to the members on a favorable conditions. In 1872 with the aim to minimize financial risks and to ensure free information exchange, Raiffeisen has united the unions on a regional level intoregional cooperative credit union, and in 1877 the central office has been opened.
The first Raiffeisen bank has been opened in 1886, and after 10 years the amount of such banks was 600.
Later, in 1927, the banks has been unified into Raiffeisen Zentralbank. When the owners has decided to extend Raiffeisen banks abroad, the Group began to develop actively. The style of market expansion – is a business mergers, as a minimum – some bank’s controlling stake. If we consider carefully financial indicators, we may conclude that expansion strategy of Raiffeisen Group with the help of Eastern European markets has been really successful . The evidence of that are the Raiffeisen stock prices.
Today, Raiffeisen Group – is the biggest in Austria, it has the largest branches network and accounts the quarter of Austrian banking system.
In 2010 it was decided on a legal basis to merge two companies Raiffeisen Zentralbank Osterreich AG (RZB) and Raiffeisen International Bank-Holding AG into Raiffeisen Bank International AG.
