The economy of Latvia is an open economy in Europe and is part of the European Single Market. Latvia is a member of the World Trade Organization (WTO) since 1999, a member of the European Union since 2004, a member of the Eurozone since 2014 and a member of the OECD since 2016. Latvia is ranked the 14th in the world by the Ease of Doing Business Index prepared by the World Bank Group. According to the Human Development Report 2011, Latvia belongs to the group of very high human development countries. Due to its geographical location, transit services are highly developed, along with timber and wood processing, agriculture and food products, and manufacturing of machinery and electronic devices.
Nordea Bank Abp, commonly referred to as Nordea, is a Nordic financial services group operating in northern Europe with headquarters in Helsinki, Finland. The name is a blend of the words "Nordic" and "idea". The bank is the result of the successive mergers and acquisitions of the Finnish, Swedish, Danish, and Norwegian banks of Merita Bank, Nordbanken, Unidanmark, and Christiania Bank og Kreditkasse that took place between 1997 and 2001. The Nordic countries are considered Nordea's home market, having finalised the sales of their Baltic operations in 2019. Nordea is listed on Nasdaq Nordic exchanges in Helsinki, Copenhagen, and Stockholm and Nordea ADR is listed in the US.
Skandinaviska Enskilda Banken AB, abbreviated SEB, is a northern European financial services group headquartered in Stockholm, Sweden. In Sweden and the Baltic countries, SEB has a full financial service offering. In Denmark, Finland, Norway, Germany, and the United Kingdom, the bank's operations are focused on corporate and investment banking services to corporate and institutional clients. The bank was founded by the Swedish Wallenberg family, which is still SEB's largest shareholder through investment company Investor AB.
Citigroup Inc. or Citi is an American multinational investment bank and financial services corporation headquartered in New York City. The company was formed by the merger of banking giant Citicorp and financial conglomerate Travelers Group in 1998; Travelers was subsequently spun off from the company in 2002. Citigroup owns Citicorp, the holding company for Citibank, as well as several international subsidiaries. Citigroup is incorporated in Delaware.
Hansabank was a bank operating in Estonia, Latvia, and Lithuania owned by the FöreningsSparbanken/Swedbank, a Swedish bank. Following a decision taken by the Swedbank group on 15 September 2008, the Hansabank name was discontinued in 2009 with all operations rebranded under the Swedbank name.
SEB banka is one of the largest banks in Latvia and a part of the Swedish SEB Group. Nowadays, its main rivals in the Latvian banking market are Swedbank, Luminor and Citadele bank.
Lehman Brothers Inc. was an American global financial services firm founded in 1847. Before filing for bankruptcy in 2008, Lehman was the fourth-largest investment bank in the United States, with about 25,000 employees worldwide. It was doing business in investment banking, equity, fixed-income and derivatives sales and trading, research, investment management, private equity, and private banking. Lehman was operational for 158 years from its founding in 1850 until 2008.
Jefferies Group LLC is an American multinational independent investment bank and financial services company that is headquartered in New York City. The firm provides clients with capital markets and financial advisory services, institutional brokerage, securities research, and asset management. This includes mergers and acquisitions, restructuring, and other financial advisory services. The Capital Markets segment also includes its securities trading and investment banking activities.
Rietumu is a Latvian private commercial bank founded in 1992.
Ūkio Bankas was a Lithuanian commercial bank based in Kaunas. More than 50% of shares are owned by Lithuanian businessman Vladimir Romanov who therefore is in the control of the bank. It was the fifth largest and oldest private bank in Lithuania.
DNB A/S The Bank’s head office is located in Copenhagen, while the Bank has operations in Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania. The latter three operate as subsidiaries of the bank. Bank DnB NORD Group has approx. 3,100 employees, 930,000 customers and a consolidated balance sheet of approx. EUR 10.0 billion.
The Independent Amateur Hockey League is the largest amateur ice hockey league in the Baltic States. Located in Riga, Latvia. It unites more than 80 teams and about 2 400 players in 8 leagues.
ABB, the largest bank in Azerbaijan, is an open joint-stock company whose shares are owned by the Azerbaijan state. Its head office is located in Azerbaijan.
A bad bank is a corporate structure which isolates illiquid and high risk assets held by a bank or a financial organisation, or perhaps a group of banks or financial organisations. A bank may accumulate a large portfolio of debts or other financial instruments which unexpectedly become at risk of partial or full default. A large volume of non-performing assets usually make it difficult for the bank to raise capital, for example through sales of bonds. In these circumstances, the bank may wish to segregate its good assets from its bad assets through the creation of a bad bank. The goal of the segregation is to allow investors to assess the bank's financial health with greater certainty. A bad bank might be established by one bank or financial institution as part of a strategy to deal with a difficult financial situation, or by a government or some other official institution as part of an official response to financial problems across a number of institutions in the financial sector.
ABLV Bank was one of the largest private banks in the Baltic States, headquartered in Riga, Latvia with representative offices abroad from 1993 to 2018.
The 2007–2008 financial crisis, or Global Financial Crisis (GFC), was a severe worldwide economic crisis that occurred in the early 21st century. It was the most serious financial crisis since the Great Depression (1929). Predatory lending targeting low-income homebuyers, excessive risk-taking by global financial institutions, and the bursting of the United States housing bubble culminated in a "perfect storm".
AS Citadele banka is a Latvian bank and financial and asset manager. The principal market of operation for the Citadele Group is the Baltic States. Citadele was the exclusive cooperation partner of American Express in Latvia and Lithuania, possessing the right to issue American Express payment cards until 1 December 2016.
Banka Baltija was a Latvian bank which in the early 1990s was one of the largest banks in the country. It was founded in 1993, but closed down due to bankruptcy in June 1995.
The Baltic states' housing bubble was an economic bubble involving major cities in Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania. The three Baltic countries had enjoyed a relatively strong economic growth between 2000 and 2006, and the real estate sectors had performed well since 2000. In fact, in between 2005Q1 and 2007Q1, the official house price index for Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania recorded a sharp jump of 104.6%, 134.3% and 106.7%. By comparison, the official house price index for Euro Area increased by 11.8% for a similar time period.
Parex Bank was a Latvian bank founded in 1992 by Valērijs Kargins and Viktors Krasovickis as a privately owned full-service banking company in Riga, Latvia that was very dominant in currency exchange in the 1990s. It had local and international clients in both the West and Russia with close ties to the Tambovskaya Russian mafia in St Petersburg and Vladimir Putin.
