History of Royal Bank

Fredrick T. Walker was a young banker with a vision and a motive from the west coast of Canada. Like his fellow peers, they were people of the Maritimes. In 1980, at age fifteen he had joined forces with the Merchants' Bank of Halifax, an upstart of Maritime Bank. The bank primarily took discounted promissory notes and acceptances, made advances on approved securities, purchased and sold bills of exchange, received money on deposits, and transacted all other business matters connected with a banking establishment. In 1882 the Merchants Bank opened an agency specializing in a franchise operation in Bermuda and captured some of the booming trading activity between the Caribbean and Halifax. The Bank of Bermuda Ltd eventually bought out the rights from the agency in 1889, which ended attempts to expand operations rather than branching out. In 1901, the Maritime bank had adopted a new name to The Royal Bank of Canada, but it was shortened to Royal Bank of Canada in the early 1990's. In 1907 Royal Bank moved their head offices from Halifax to Montreal's energetic St. James Street, Canada's financial capital. Starting in 1910, the bank set out a major drive to seek and to expand more rapidly. Domestically, the bank acquired the operations of the Union Bank of Halifax, Traders Bank of Canada, Qubec Bank, the Union Bank of Canada, and the Northern Crown Bank. Truly becoming a national bank after acquiring 113 branches located primarily in Western Canada, through the acquisition of the Northern Crown Bank alone. Based on assets, RBC had become Canada's largest bank by 1920, which was recorded to be worth $594.7 million at the time. By 1925, the bank's international network was over 120 branches, expanding from the Caribbeans down to South America During 1920s and 1930s, Royal Bank had a downturn due to worldwide economic depression and started stricter lending and branch closures. Total assets took a 10% decline during 1930 to 1935,

the number of branches were at a low of 652 worldwide until 1944. The bank would never start new operations to increase profits until 1970s. Following the end of World War II, the bank returned to sustained profitability and growth. In 1961 the Royal Bank became the first Canadian bank to install a computer, proclaiming a new way to progress the business of banking. By June 1967 the bank had introduced Magnetic Ink Character Recognition for encoding and processing cheques. They opened a computer centre in Montral and were the first to make a transaction using a computer. In the 1970s, the bank returned to a strategy of expanding its operations by obtainment, forming joint ventures across the globe. Between 1969 and 1979, the bank's total, worldwide assets increased to $50.7 billion and its staff grew from 23 181 to 38 895 employees, an increase of almost 68 %. Starting in 1986, several changes to Canadian financial markets deleting the outline between Canadian financial services landscape - banks, trust companies, insurance companies, and investment dealers. It permitted cross-ownership in a less regulated environment. The Royal Bank acquired companies such as: Dominion Securities, Voyageur Insurance Company, and Royal Trust in the years between 1988 and 1993. Now Royal Bank of Canada is still the largest financial institution in Canada. The bank serves over 17 million clients and has over 80,000 employees worldwide. The company Headquarters are now located in Toronto, Ontario. Royal Bank is the largest Canadian company by revenue and market capitalization listed by The Globe and Mail, currently ranked 68 on the Forbes Financial list and has operations in Canada, the United States, and 51 other countries.