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These words uttered by Mustafa Kemal before the Council of Ministers which summoned in July 1924, express his aspirations for the foundation of a national bank.

The inception of the country's first truly national bank following the promulgation of the Republic dates back to 26 August 1924, mandated by Atatürk, consequent to the First Economy Congress in İzmir. Isbank begun to operate with two branches and 37 staff under the leadership of Celal Bayar, the first General Manager to run the bank.

The Grand Victory which preceded the proclamation of the Republic order entailed a period during which resolutions to the state's economic and social problems were sought. There was a growing and deeply rooted sentiment signalling the need for a truly national establishment and the birth of a banking system that was capable of the financing means to back up economic activities, managing funds accumulated as a result of policies providing savings incentives and where necessary extending resources which could trigger industrial impetus.

The birth of a new country heavily depended on the presence of banking activities nation wide, the drive for industrial development, animating national savings, financing fundamental economic breakthroughs and the means to meet financial borrowings. The aftermath of World War I culminated in a wide array of progress, including financial services which soon took off with an accelerated pace leading to technological advances and the designation of previously unheard methods and criteria governing business. Turkey was to suffer deprivation from such innovations and lacked qualified and skilled human resources. Isbank began operating at a time of such economic strain.

Isbank boasts continuous growth committed to its founding principles, restoring its strength and vigour with each passing year. The Bank tops the list of Turkey's most respected and trustful enterprises, while carving itself a place among the world's largest corporations. Isbank, a publicly traded firm since its inception enjoys a peerless stakeholder base. To this day the state Pension Fund has brokered the offering of stock options to employees and retired staff in the company which has reached 41.5%. As of December 2006 41.5 % of Isbank shares are held by Isbank's own private Pension Fund, 28.1 % are Ataturk's shares that are represented by Republican People's Party and 30.4 % are free float. In May 1998, 12.3% of the Bank's total shares previously held by the Turkish Treasury have been sold to national and international investors in a highly successful public offering. Today the shares are listed on the Istanbul (ISE) and London Stock Exchanges. The Bank's market capitalization valued at NTL 17,971,848 thousand by the end of December 2006 is the second one among private corporations in Turkey. As of 29th December 2006, Isbank's market value constitutes 7,81 % of the ISE market value where 316 corporations were traded and whose market value was NTL 230,037,678 thousand.

The followings are examples of the Bank's forerunning achievements:

• Introduction of child's coin bank's which has triggered and made mainstream propensity to save in the society
• The use of cheques for daily transactions
• Initiating electronic banking in the country with a sound technological groundwork
• Introduction of ATM's. Isbank was the first in the industry to coin a generic name for teller machines
• Overseas branches in Europe and Turkish Republic of Northern Cyprus
• Saving accounts
• Mutual funds
• Operation of an in house securities division
• Interactive banking service since July 1996
• Deployment of Netmatik machines, to enhance online banking among clients without access to PC's
• Introduction of mobile banking on WAP enabled GSM phones
• Bankamatik(+) which allows the money to be put directly to the account of the client
• Introduction of Maximum Cash Point which allows clients to draw cash from POS machine where there are no atms available

The Bank deployed one of the world's most advanced online real time technologies in the light of headspinning innovations and developments that have influenced the banking sector following the 80's. Today the Bank's,

• 2834 ATM's
• 742 deposit-taking ATM's
• 911 Netmatik Machines
• 103 CRS
• 891 branches
• 11 overseas branches (one of them is an off-shore branch)
• 1 Representative office in China
• Head Office
• İşbank GmbH, which operates through 12 branches in Germany, 2 branches in the Netherlands, and 1 branch each in France and Switzerland

are connected online real-time.

Such an advanced technology enables Isbank to run real time transactions and maintain uniformity of services throughout its network.

The state of the art hardware and software technologies deployed throughout the organization compliment the Bank's on line real time operations and efficient self service banking options all of which have equipped the Bank with an examplar image in the global banking industry.

(*) As of 31 December 2006.