The Chartered Bank was founded by Scotsman James Wilson in 1853. Its expansion continued through the 1860s to the 1900s as it opened branches across Asia. The Chartered Bank played a major role in the development of trade with the East and its traditional business was cotton from Mumbai, indigo and tea from Kolkata, rice from Burma, sugar from Java, tobacco from Sumatra, hemp from Manila and silk from Yokohama.
Meanwhile, another Scotsman John Paterson founded the The Standard Bank in the Cape Province of South Africa in 1862. Both companies had similar aims -- they wanted to capitalise on the huge expansion of trade and earn handsome profits by financing the movement of goods from Europe to the East and to Africa.
Both banks survived the First World War and the Depression. During the Second World War, however, they suffered loss of business and closure of branches. And then, in the fifties and sixties, countries in Asia and Africa gained their independence; this too affected them.
The two banks decided on a friendly merger in 1969 and Standard Chartered Bank came into being.
Image: Peter Sands, group chief executive, Standard Chartered, recieves the stamp from President Pratibha Patil at Rashtrapati Bhavan.
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