BG Bank

The history of BG Bank in Denmark is a story of a post office giro system, Sparekassen Bikuben, three mergers and amalgamation with Danske Bank Denmark in 2007.

1920s – post office giro system
Sparekassen Bikuben was founded in 1857. Many years later, and after much political debate, the post office giro system was launched on January 1, 1920. The banks were not worried because they retained their monopoly on cheques, but savings banks were worried about the increased competition.

1960s-1980s – Bikuben buys up banks
The post office giro system quickly caught on, but by the 1960s several small savings banks found the competition too intense. In 1967 Bikuben began taking over a large number of them, resulting in 73 mergers in total. In the 1970s Bikuben already had a nationwide network and became the largest savings bank in the country.
         
The post office giro system turned out to be a great success for the Danish Post and Telegraph service, but in 1986 Post Office Giro was converted to an independent profit centre. Two years later, Post Office Giro became a state-owned company, and in 1991 it was floated as a listed company trading under the Girobank name.

1995 – merger between Bikuben and GiroBank
In 1989, Bikuben became a public limited company with its shares were listed on the Copenhagen Stock Exchange. In 1994, Bikuben’s head office was considering the idea of expansion. Girobank happened to be looking for a partner at the same time. A year later, in 1995, Sparekassen Bikuben merged with Girobank and BG Bank was born.

1998 and 2001 – two years, two mergers
In 1995, BG Bank formed a partnership with Topdanmark in order to satisfy the demand from customers for pension and insurance products. BG Bank also joined forces with Realkredit Danmark to offer mortgage finance.

In 1998, the collaboration led to the merger of BG Bank and Realkredit Danmark with the formation of a joint holding company, Kapital Holding A/S. However, the distinctive names of the two original companies were kept intact, a policy that continued after the merger with the Danske Bank Group in 2001. 

2007 – from yellow to blue
In 2007, BG Bank was fully absorbed into the Danske Bank brand. “It was a difficult decision," CEO Peter Straarup said. "BG Bank is a smooth-running operation, and the bank has loyal staff and a good team spirit. Both management and staff have worked incredibly hard, and the bank has produced excellent results. Nonetheless, we have accepted that with identities so similar it is hard to run the two banks separately in a meaningful way.”