Chapter One Introduction, Products & Offerings of Prime Bank Limited

1. Introduction
The Jews in Jerusalem introduced a kind of banking in the form of money lending before the birth of Christ. The word 'Bank' was probably derived from the word 'bench' as during ancient time Jews used to do money -lending business sitting on long benches. First modern banking was introduced in 1668 in Stockholm as 'Svingss Pis Bank’, which opened up a new era of banking activities throughout the European Mainland. In the South Asian region, the Afghan traders popularly known as Kabuliwallas introduced early banking system. Muslim businessmen from Kabul, Afghanistan came to India and started money lending business in exchange of interest sometime in 1312 A.D. They were known as 'Kabuliwallas'.
The number of banks in all now stands at 48 in Bangladesh. Out of the 48 banks, 4 are Nationalized Commercial Banks (NCBs), 30 local private commercial banks, 9 foreign banks and the rest five are Development Financial Institutions (DFIs).
Sonali Bank is the largest among the NCBs while Pubali is leading in the private ones. Among the 9 foreign banks, Standard Chartered has become the largest in the country. Besides the scheduled banks, Samabai (Cooperative) Bank, Ansar-VDP Bank, Karmasansthan (Employment) Bank and Grameen bank are functioning in the financial sector. The number of total branches of all scheduled banks is 6,038 as of June 2000. Of the branches, 39.95 per cent (2,412) are located in the urban areas and 60.05 per cent (3,626) in the rural areas. Of the branches NCBs hold 3,616, private commercial banks 1,214, foreign banks 31 and specialized banks 1,177.
Bangladesh Bank (BB) regulates and supervises the activities of all banks. The BB is now carrying out a reform program to ensure quality services by the banks.

1.2. History of Prime Bank

Prime Bank started its