Pubali Bank Limited the successor of the former Eastern Mercantile Bank Limited incorporated in 1959 under the companies act 1913. Eastern Mercantile Bank Ltd was nationalised under Bangladesh Bank's (Nationalisation) Order 1972 and was renamed as Pubali Bank. It was denationalised on 30 June 1983 under the Bangladesh Bank's (Nationalisation) Amendment Ordinance 1983. In 1972, the authorised and paid up capital of Pubali Bank was Tk 50 million and Tk 10 million respectively. At the time of denationalisation in 1983, the paid up capital of the bank was Tk 20 million. In 1984, the authorised and paid up capital of the bank was enhanced to Tk 160 million divided into 1.6 million ordinary shares of Tk 100 each. In the same year, the bank created a reserve fund of Tk 2.30 million. Following the expansion of business activities along with the increases in the volume of assets and liabilities, authorised capital was raised to Tk 5,000 million at the end of the business year 1999, while the paid up capital remained unchanged. Reserve funds of the bank were enhanced to Tk 644.2 million in December 1999. The bank is listed with both Dhaka and Chittagong Stock Exchanges.

The functions of the bank include deposit mobilisation, financing productive activities, conducting foreign exchange business and providing various types of banking services to the customers. Total deposits of the bank on 31 December 1972 were Tk 767.98 million, which rose to Tk 5,409.11 million in December 1984. Total loans and advances of the bank during these two reference periods were Tk 471.64 million and Tk 4,333.46 million respectively. Total liabilities (assets) of bank were valued at Tk 7,233.64 million on 31 December 1984. Compared to these, the value of total deposits, total loans and advances, and total liabilities (assets) on 31 December 2000 was Tk 29,590.1 million, Tk 21,572.2 million and Tk 33,436.9 million respectively. The deposits comprised savings deposits Tk 11,608.6 million, fixed deposits Tk 5,557.3 million, current deposits Tk 3,933.1 million, and other deposits Tk 8491.1 million.

Interest rate offered by the bank varied between 6.5% to 9%. The lendings were mostly in Jute, textile, readymade garments and other large, medium and small scale industries, transport, housing, small loans, rural and agricultural credit, micro credit, credit to trade and commerce and export-import financing. Rates of interest charged on its loans and advances varied between 13% and 16%. The bank has huge non-performing loans and the classified loans amounted to Tk 7,601.5 million (35.24% of total) on 31 December 2000. In 2000, the bank financed 298 projects in large, medium and small-scale industries. In addition to loans and advances, the bank lent Tk 230 million in the call money market and borrowed Tk 309 million from the inter-bank call money market in 2000.

Foreign exchange business handled by the bank in 2000 amounted to Tk 15,930 million which comprised export servicing Tk 6,100 million, import financing Tk 8,270 million, and remittance services Tk 1,560 million. The bank has correspondent relationships with 554 banks all over the world. Investments of the bank in 1999 stood at Tk 3,318 million in government securities, income tax bond, treasury bills, loans to government, national investment bond, bridge financing, shares and debentures of companies and national prize bonds. The bank earned net profits after taxes but before adjusting provision requirements in all years from 1984 to 2000 except 1990 and 1991.

The management of the bank is vested in a 14-member board of directors with the managing director as its chief executive. In 2001, the bank had 350 branches (196 urban and 154 rural) and the total number of its employees was 4,882. [S M Mahfuzur Rahman]