New name, new ambition

The change follows the establishment of a new group by the bank's owners - Norddeutsche Landesbank Girozentrale and DnB Nor - the largest Norwegian bank. The group's business focuses on Baltic countries - Poland, Denmark, Finland, Latvia, Lithuania and Estonia.

The bank's president, Jarosław Dąbrowski, hopes that the new shareholder will further boost the bank's dynamic growth. "As of today our primary goal is to be in the first 15 largest banks in Poland," Dąbrowski said. In the first four months of the year the bank's net profit reached zł.7.9 million - a 52-percent growth on the corresponding period in 2005. Both the bank's assets and interest results also grew by around 50 percent. "In every aspect of operation we are growing faster than the market," Dąbrowski said.

The bank wants to reach the top 15 by developing new products like debt management, factoring and transaction services. Investments, mainly in new products, employment and IT, should amount to zł.12 million this year.

DnB Nord remains a corporate bank specializing in products and services for companies. "We will seriously consider entering new segments of the market, like products for SMEs and even retail banking," Dąbrowski announced.