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108-609: The Commission's existence ended in 2011, with its duties were shared between the National Bank of Belgium and the newly established Financial Services and Markets Authority . As with most Belgian financial institutions, the Commission was generally referred to by its French name in its first decades of existence, including in English-speaking contexts. As Belgian linguistic practices and sensitivities evolved in

216-659: A Neutrality Pact in April 1941, and Japan adopted the doctrine of Nanshin-ron , promoted by the Navy, which took its focus southward and eventually led to war with the United States and the Western Allies. In Europe, Germany and Italy were becoming more aggressive. In March 1938, Germany annexed Austria , again provoking little response from other European powers. Encouraged, Hitler began pressing German claims on

324-578: A cautious French probe into the Saarland . The Western Allies also began a naval blockade of Germany , which aimed to damage the country's economy and war effort. Germany responded by ordering U-boat warfare against Allied merchant and warships, which would later escalate into the Battle of the Atlantic . On 8 September, German troops reached the suburbs of Warsaw . The Polish counter-offensive to

432-625: A German Commissioner, Hans von Becker, overseeing both institutions. The National Bank and Bank of Issue together financed the German war effort by printing large amounts of Belgian currency, triggering high inflation. Before the war started, the National Bank had prudently moved one third of its gold reserves to the United Kingdom and another third to the United States and Canada. in early 1940, Finance Minister Camille Gutt directed

540-510: A guarantor for paper discounted by the bank. In Luxembourg, following a bilateral agreement of 23 May 1935 modifying the terms of the Belgium–Luxembourg Economic Union , the National Bank on 16 August 1935 purchased an urban mansion that had been erected in 1882-1883 on a design by local architect Oscar Belanger  [ lb ] , on 43 avenue Monterey  [ lb ] . After renovation, that building opened to

648-663: A monumental banking hall . The initial plans foresaw the demolition of the Hôtel du Gouverneur , but preservationists won the decision to keep it standing in 1948. The construction works were eventually completed in 1958. The complex designed by Van Goethem includes the printing presses building on the other side of the Boulevard de Berlaimont, connected to the main headquarters by an underground tunnel. It features exterior sculpture by Marcel Rau  [ fr ] , including aluminium figures of Mercury , Minerva , and Vulcan above

756-524: A pretext to initiate the invasion. The first German attack of the war came against the Polish defences at Westerplatte . The United Kingdom responded with an ultimatum for Germany to cease military operations, and on 3 September, after the ultimatum was ignored, Britain and France declared war on Germany. During the Phoney War period, the alliance provided no direct military support to Poland, outside of

864-728: A pretext to worsen relations. On 29 August, Hitler demanded that a Polish plenipotentiary immediately travel to Berlin to negotiate the handover of Danzig , and to allow a plebiscite in the Polish Corridor in which the German minority would vote on secession. The Poles refused to comply with the German demands, and on the night of 30–31 August in a confrontational meeting with the British ambassador Nevile Henderson , Ribbentrop declared that Germany considered its claims rejected. On 1 September 1939, Germany invaded Poland after having staged several false flag border incidents as

972-565: A role of financial ambassador to international economic and financial bodies; and services for the Belgian State, the Belgian financial sector, and the general public. The Belgian government has held half of the National Bank's equity since the aftermath of World War II . It thus remains one of relatively few central banks whose equity capital is partly in private hands, with stock being traded on Euronext Brussels . The National Bank

1080-475: A secret protocol that defined German and Soviet "spheres of influence" (western Poland and Lithuania for Germany; eastern Poland , Finland, Estonia , Latvia and Bessarabia for the Soviet Union), and raised the question of continuing Polish independence. The pact neutralised the possibility of Soviet opposition to a campaign against Poland and assured that Germany would not have to face the prospect of

1188-774: A similar pact and rejected ceding part of its territory to the Soviet Union. The Soviet Union invaded Finland in November 1939, and was subsequently expelled from the League of Nations for this crime of aggression. Despite overwhelming numerical superiority, Soviet military success during the Winter War was modest, and the Finno-Soviet war ended in March 1940 with some Finnish concessions of territory . In June 1940,

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1296-467: A two-front war, as it had in World War   I. Immediately afterwards, Hitler ordered the attack to proceed on 26 August, but upon hearing that the United Kingdom had concluded a formal mutual assistance pact with Poland and that Italy would maintain neutrality, he decided to delay it. In response to British requests for direct negotiations to avoid war, Germany made demands on Poland, which served as

1404-464: A venue for events. The building features sculpture by Guillaume de Groot , Jean Schoonjans and Édouard Fiers  [ fr ] , and painted ceilings by Joseph Stallaert and Faustin Besson  [ fr ] . The entire block was remodeled in the mid-20th century with a state-of-the-art complex built for the bank as part of the broader transportation and urban transformation project known as

1512-421: Is of special interest to the student of banking systems because of [...] the ability of its founders to garner up the results of the experience of Belgium and of other countries in what they conceived to be the best attainable form of organization". Its charter was renewed in 1872 and in 1900, each time giving rise to extensive parliamentary debates about its mandate and setup. On 26 August 1914, shortly before

1620-532: Is the Belgian member of the Eurosystem . It was established by a law of 5 May 1850 and has been the monetary authority for Belgium from then until 1998, issuing the Belgian franc (albeit with interruption during World War I and duplication during World War II , when two National Banks with diverging loyalties operated in parallel from Brussels and London between July 1941 and September 1944). Since 2011,

1728-604: The Anglo-German Naval Agreement and the German–Polish declaration of non-aggression . The situation became a crisis in late August as German troops continued to mobilise against the Polish border. On 23 August the Soviet Union signed a non-aggression pact with Germany, after tripartite negotiations for a military alliance between France, the United Kingdom, and Soviet Union had stalled. This pact had

1836-617: The Banque de Belgique , until then the two main financial institutions in the country which had been negatively impacted by financial turmoil in 1848. As part of the same train of reform, Frère-Orban established the Caisse générale de retraite , which later became the Caisse Générale d'Épargne et de Retraite . Initially the National Bank was mainly an issuing and discounting bank, leaving the business of longer-term credit and investment to

1944-646: The Belgian Congo joining the Sterling area . The Banque du Congo Belge thus became an important financial agency of the exiled government during the war, and temporarily severed links with its occupied head office in Brussels. Meanwhile, the National Bank under occupation in Brussels kept operating, led until the liberation of Belgium by Goffin who was simultaneously President of the Bank of Issue, and with

2052-689: The British Empire , with fighting in the Balkans , Mediterranean, and Middle East , the aerial Battle of Britain and the Blitz , and naval Battle of the Atlantic . Through a series of campaigns and treaties, Germany took control of much of continental Europe and formed the Axis alliance with Italy , Japan , and other countries. In June 1941, Germany led the European Axis in an invasion of

2160-669: The European banking crisis of 1931 , the National Bank had large holding in pound sterling and therefore incurred significant losses when the United Kingdom exited the Gold standard in September 1931. It had to rely on an emergency non-interest-bearing loan from the Belgian government to stay afloat. When Belgium was invaded in May 1940, its leadership and much of the staff again left the country and initially relocated to France. In late June,

2268-581: The German Revolution of 1918–1919 , and a democratic government, later known as the Weimar Republic , was created. The interwar period saw strife between supporters of the new republic and hardline opponents on both the political right and left. Italy, as an Entente ally, had made some post-war territorial gains; however, Italian nationalists were angered that the promises made by the United Kingdom and France to secure Italian entrance into

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2376-853: The German invasion of Poland and the United Kingdom and France 's declaration of war on Germany two days later on 3 September 1939. Dates for the beginning of the Pacific War include the start of the Second Sino-Japanese War on 7 July 1937, or the earlier Japanese invasion of Manchuria , on 19 September 1931. Others follow the British historian A. J. P. Taylor , who stated that the Sino-Japanese War and war in Europe and its colonies occurred simultaneously, and

2484-576: The Italian mainland , and Allied offensives in the Pacific—cost the Axis powers their initiative and forced them into strategic retreat on all fronts. In 1944, the Western Allies invaded German-occupied France at Normandy , while the Soviet Union regained its territorial losses and pushed Germany and its allies westward. At the same time, Japan suffered reversals in mainland Asia, while the Allies crippled

2592-553: The Japanese Navy and captured key islands . The war in Europe concluded with the liberation of German-occupied territories ; the invasion of Germany by the Western Allies and the Soviet Union, culminating in the fall of Berlin to Soviet troops; Hitler's suicide ; and the German unconditional surrender on 8 May 1945 . Following the refusal of Japan to surrender on the terms of the Potsdam Declaration ,

2700-695: The League of Nations as a force to preserve peace. Both Italy and Ethiopia were member nations, but the League did little when the former clearly violated Article X of the League's Covenant . The United Kingdom and France supported imposing sanctions on Italy for the invasion, but the sanctions were not fully enforced and failed to end the Italian invasion. Italy subsequently dropped its objections to Germany's goal of absorbing Austria . When civil war broke out in Spain, Hitler and Mussolini lent military support to

2808-504: The National Bank of Belgium , while its conduct-of-business supervisory duties went to the Financial Services and Markets Authority (FSMA). This Belgium-related article is a stub . You can help Misplaced Pages by expanding it . National Bank of Belgium The National Bank of Belgium ( NBB ; Dutch : Nationale Bank van België , French : Banque nationale de Belgique , German : Belgische Nationalbank )

2916-731: The Nationalist rebels , led by General Francisco Franco . Italy supported the Nationalists to a greater extent than the Nazis: Mussolini sent more than 70,000 ground troops, 6,000 aviation personnel, and 720 aircraft to Spain. The Soviet Union supported the existing government of the Spanish Republic . More than 30,000 foreign volunteers, known as the International Brigades , also fought against

3024-534: The North–South connection . Architect Marcel Van Goethem  [ fr ] was appointed project architect on 1 February 1940, but the reconstruction process was suspended during the German occupation of Belgium during World War II and construction work only started in 1946. The new building features a 200-meters-long monumental Stripped Classicism façade on the Boulevard de Berlaimont / Berlaimontlaan and

3132-690: The Rome–Berlin Axis . A month later, Germany and Japan signed the Anti-Comintern Pact , which Italy joined the following year. The Kuomintang (KMT) party in China launched a unification campaign against regional warlords and nominally unified China in the mid-1920s, but was soon embroiled in a civil war against its former Chinese Communist Party (CCP) allies and new regional warlords . In 1931, an increasingly militaristic Empire of Japan , which had long sought influence in China as

3240-590: The Soviet–Japanese Neutrality Pact in April 1941. By contrast, the Germans were steadily making preparations for an attack on the Soviet Union, massing forces on the Soviet border. Hitler believed that the United Kingdom's refusal to end the war was based on the hope that the United States and the Soviet Union would enter the war against Germany sooner or later. On 31 July 1940, Hitler decided that

3348-598: The Stresa Front in April 1935 in order to contain Germany, a key step towards military globalisation ; however, that June, the United Kingdom made an independent naval agreement with Germany, easing prior restrictions. The Soviet Union, concerned by Germany's goals of capturing vast areas of Eastern Europe , drafted a treaty of mutual assistance with France. Before taking effect, though, the Franco-Soviet pact

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3456-709: The Sudetenland , an area of Czechoslovakia with a predominantly ethnic German population. Soon the United Kingdom and France followed the appeasement policy of British Prime Minister Neville Chamberlain and conceded this territory to Germany in the Munich Agreement , which was made against the wishes of the Czechoslovak government, in exchange for a promise of no further territorial demands. Soon afterwards, Germany and Italy forced Czechoslovakia to cede additional territory to Hungary, and Poland annexed

3564-658: The Tanggu Truce was signed in 1933. Thereafter, Chinese volunteer forces continued the resistance to Japanese aggression in Manchuria , and Chahar and Suiyuan . After the 1936 Xi'an Incident , the Kuomintang and CCP forces agreed on a ceasefire to present a united front to oppose Japan. The Second Italo-Ethiopian War was a brief colonial war that began in October 1935 and ended in May 1936. The war began with

3672-579: The Trans-Olza region of Czechoslovakia. Although all of Germany's stated demands had been satisfied by the agreement, privately Hitler was furious that British interference had prevented him from seizing all of Czechoslovakia in one operation. In subsequent speeches Hitler attacked British and Jewish "war-mongers" and in January 1939 secretly ordered a major build-up of the German navy to challenge British naval supremacy. In March 1939, Germany invaded

3780-558: The Treaty of Craiova . The loss of one-third of Romania's 1939 territory caused a coup against King Carol II, turning Romania into a fascist dictatorship under Marshal Ion Antonescu , with a course set towards the Axis in the hopes of a German guarantee. Meanwhile, German-Soviet political relations and economic co-operation gradually stalled, and both states began preparations for war. In April 1940, Germany invaded Denmark and Norway to protect shipments of iron ore from Sweden , which

3888-749: The United Kingdom and France to declare war on Germany. Poland was divided between Germany and the Soviet Union under the Molotov–Ribbentrop Pact , in which they had agreed on " spheres of influence " in Eastern Europe. In 1940, the Soviets annexed the Baltic states and parts of Finland and Romania . After the fall of France in June 1940, the war continued mainly between Germany and

3996-426: The Wehrmacht rapidly advanced to the Channel and cut off the Allied forces in Belgium, trapping the bulk of the Allied armies in a cauldron on the Franco-Belgian border near Lille. The United Kingdom was able to evacuate a significant number of Allied troops from the continent by early June, although they had to abandon almost all their equipment. On 10 June, Italy invaded France , declaring war on both France and

4104-451: The aftermath of World War I and the rise of fascism in Europe and militarism in Japan . Key events leading up to the war included Japan's invasion of Manchuria , the Spanish Civil War , the outbreak of the Second Sino-Japanese War , and Germany's annexations of Austria and the Sudetenland . World War II is generally considered to have begun on 1 September 1939, when Nazi Germany , under Adolf Hitler , invaded Poland , prompting

4212-404: The reunification of East and West Germany to take place and resolved most post–World War   II issues. No formal peace treaty between Japan and the Soviet Union was ever signed, although the state of war between the two countries was terminated by the Soviet–Japanese Joint Declaration of 1956 , which also restored full diplomatic relations between them. World War I had radically altered

4320-605: The strategic bombing of population centres and delivery of the only two nuclear weapons ever used in war. World War II was the deadliest conflict in history, resulting in 70 to 85 million deaths , more than half being civilians. Millions died in genocides , including the Holocaust of European Jews, as well as from massacres, starvation, and disease. Following the Allied powers' victory, Germany , Austria , Japan , and Korea were occupied, and war crimes tribunals were conducted against German and Japanese leaders . The causes of World War II included unresolved tensions in

4428-409: The Allies were attempting to cut off . Denmark capitulated after six hours , and despite Allied support , Norway was conquered within two months. British discontent over the Norwegian campaign led to the resignation of Prime Minister Neville Chamberlain , who was replaced by Winston Churchill on 10   May 1940. On the same day, Germany launched an offensive against France . To circumvent

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4536-400: The Axis war against the Soviet Union, in Romania's case partially to recapture territory ceded to the Soviet Union . In early June 1940, the Italian Regia Aeronautica attacked and besieged Malta , a British possession. From late summer to early autumn, Italy conquered British Somaliland and made an incursion into British-held Egypt . In October, Italy attacked Greece , but the attack

4644-427: The Bank of France in New York, eventually reaching a settlement in October 1944 by which the Bank of France agreed to full retrocession. The Bank of France in turn was able to recover 130 tons after the gold was found by U.S. forces together with stolen art in a salt mine in Merkers , Thuringia and reclaimed by the National Bank via the Tripartite Commission for the Restitution of Monetary Gold . The National Bank

4752-521: The Banking Commission was renamed CBF ( French : Commission bancaire et financière , Dutch : Commissie voor het Bank- en Financiewezen ) as its duties were extended to more non-bank market segments. The CBFA was formed in 2004 by the merger of the CBF with Belgium's insurance supervisory authority OCA-CDV ( French : Office de Contrôle des Assurances , Dutch : Controledienst voor de Verzekeringen ), which had been created in 1975. The crisis experience with Fortis Group and Dexia in 2008 led to

4860-421: The Blitz , but largely ended in May 1941 after failing to significantly disrupt the British war effort. Using newly captured French ports, the German Navy enjoyed success against an over-extended Royal Navy , using U-boats against British shipping in the Atlantic . The British Home Fleet scored a significant victory on 27   May 1941 by sinking the German battleship Bismarck . In November 1939,

4968-405: The European Axis declaring war on the US. Japan conquered much of coastal China and Southeast Asia , but its advances in the Pacific were halted in mid-1942 after its defeat in the naval Battle of Midway ; Germany and Italy were defeated in North Africa and at Stalingrad in the Soviet Union. Key setbacks in 1943—including German defeats on the Eastern Front, the Allied invasions of Sicily and

5076-410: The French possessions of Syria and Lebanon , assisted by the Free French . With the situation in Europe and Asia relatively stable, Germany, Japan, and the Soviet Union made preparations for war. With the Soviets wary of mounting tensions with Germany, and the Japanese planning to take advantage of the European War by seizing resource-rich European possessions in Southeast Asia , the two powers signed

5184-460: The German forces in Brussels forced the creation of a Bank of Issue ( French : Banque d'Émission ) to supply the occupied country's currency needs and to finance the payments of occupation costs. Following France's defeat, however, Governor Georges Janssen led the National Bank's return to Brussels by mid-July, even though he ensured that a representative in London could manage the Bank's foreign assets. The Bank of Issue kept acting as an adjunct to

5292-426: The Germans, and the last large operational unit of the Polish Army surrendered on 6   October . Despite the military defeat, Poland never surrendered; instead, it formed the Polish government-in-exile and a clandestine state apparatus remained in occupied Poland. A significant part of Polish military personnel evacuated to Romania and Latvia; many of them later fought against the Axis in other theatres of

5400-587: The NBB to request a recapitalization from the Belgian government. The NBB made clear that it could operate with negative equity. The NBB is one of the rare central banks in Europe that still is a private entity with private shareholders (other examples are Greece, Switzerland and Italy). The Federal Government of Belgium owns half of the National Bank's shares. the rest of the shares are listed on Euronext Brussels and widely dispersed among market participants, with no shareholder known to hold more than one percent of total equity as of early 2024. The National Bank

5508-439: The National Bank has also been Belgium's prudential supervisory authority , and since 2014, its national competent authority within European Banking Supervision . In the area of financial market infrastructure , it stands out as supervisor of Euroclear and lead overseer of SWIFT . Additional tasks include the management of foreign currency reserves; the collection, circulation and analysis of economic and financial information;

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5616-467: The National Bank, particularly by financing the clearing claims on Germany. After Janssen's death in June 1941, the London-based Belgian government in exile repudiated the appointment of its Brussels-based successor Albert Goffin and instead expanded the London office into a fully-fledged administration-in-exile of the National Bank led by former Prime Minister Georges Theunis from late November 1941. A series of agreements in 1940 and 1941 resulted in

5724-450: The Nationalists. Both Germany and the Soviet Union used this proxy war as an opportunity to test in combat their most advanced weapons and tactics. The Nationalists won the civil war in April 1939; Franco, now dictator, remained officially neutral during World War   II but generally favoured the Axis . His greatest collaboration with Germany was the sending of volunteers to fight on the Eastern Front . In July 1937, Japan captured

5832-452: The Royal Navy putting three Italian battleships out of commission after a carrier attack at Taranto , and neutralising several more warships at the Battle of Cape Matapan . Italian defeats prompted Germany to deploy an expeditionary force to North Africa; at the end of March 1941, Rommel 's Afrika Korps launched an offensive which drove back Commonwealth forces. In less than a month, Axis forces advanced to western Egypt and besieged

5940-421: The SGB and others. The National Bank's design was widely viewed as an improvement on earlier central banks. It soon became a source of reference in other countries, including the Netherlands with the reform of De Nederlandsche Bank in 1864 and Japan with the creation of the Bank of Japan in 1882. In 1910, a report of the U.S. National Monetary Commission noted: "The history of the National Bank of Belgium

6048-423: The Soviet Union occupied the entire territories of Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania, as well as the Romanian regions of Bessarabia, Northern Bukovina, and the Hertsa region . In August 1940, Hitler imposed the Second Vienna Award on Romania which led to the transfer of Northern Transylvania to Hungary. In September 1940, Bulgaria demanded Southern Dobruja from Romania with German and Italian support, leading to

6156-421: The Soviet Union , opening the Eastern Front and initially making large territorial gains. Japan aimed to dominate East Asia and the Asia-Pacific , and by 1937 was at war with the Republic of China . In December 1941, Japan attacked American and British territories in Southeast Asia and the Central Pacific , including Pearl Harbor in Hawaii , which resulted in the US and the UK declaring war against Japan, and

6264-418: The Soviet Union and Mongolia . The Japanese doctrine of Hokushin-ron , which emphasised Japan's expansion northward, was favoured by the Imperial Army during this time. This policy would prove difficult to maintain in light of the Japanese defeat at Khalkin Gol in 1939, the ongoing Second Sino-Japanese War and ally Nazi Germany pursuing neutrality with the Soviets. Japan and the Soviet Union eventually signed

6372-575: The Soviet Union should be eliminated and aimed for the conquest of Ukraine , the Baltic states and Byelorussia . However, other senior German officials like Ribbentrop saw an opportunity to create a Euro-Asian bloc against the British Empire by inviting the Soviet Union into the Tripartite Pact. In November 1940, negotiations took place to determine if the Soviet Union would join the pact. The Soviets showed some interest but asked for concessions from Finland, Bulgaria, Turkey, and Japan that Germany considered unacceptable. On 18 December 1940, Hitler issued

6480-402: The US dropped the first atomic bombs on Hiroshima and Nagasaki on 6 and 9 August. Faced with an imminent invasion of the Japanese archipelago , the possibility of further atomic bombings, and the Soviet declaration of war against Japan and its invasion of Manchuria , Japan announced its unconditional surrender on 15 August and signed a surrender document on 2 September 1945 , marking

6588-424: The United Kingdom and France guaranteed their support for Polish independence ; when Italy conquered Albania in April 1939, the same guarantee was extended to the Kingdoms of Romania and Greece . Shortly after the Franco - British pledge to Poland, Germany and Italy formalised their own alliance with the Pact of Steel . Hitler accused the United Kingdom and Poland of trying to "encircle" Germany and renounced

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6696-489: The United Kingdom attacked on 3   July in an attempt to prevent its seizure by Germany. The air Battle of Britain began in early July with Luftwaffe attacks on shipping and harbours . The German campaign for air superiority started in August but its failure to defeat RAF Fighter Command forced the indefinite postponement of the proposed German invasion of Britain . The German strategic bombing offensive intensified with night attacks on London and other cities in

6804-401: The United Kingdom. The Germans turned south against the weakened French army, and Paris fell to them on 14   June. Eight days later France signed an armistice with Germany ; it was divided into German and Italian occupation zones , and an unoccupied rump state under the Vichy Regime , which, though officially neutral, was generally aligned with Germany. France kept its fleet, which

6912-473: The United States was assisting China and the Western Allies, and had amended the Neutrality Act to allow "cash and carry" purchases by the Allies. In 1940, following the German capture of Paris, the size of the United States Navy was significantly increased . In September the United States further agreed to a trade of American destroyers for British bases . Still, a large majority of the American public continued to oppose any direct military intervention in

7020-434: The Yellow River ; this manoeuvre bought time for the Chinese to prepare their defences at Wuhan , but the city was taken by October. Japanese military victories did not bring about the collapse of Chinese resistance that Japan had hoped to achieve; instead, the Chinese government relocated inland to Chongqing and continued the war. In the mid-to-late 1930s, Japanese forces in Manchukuo had sporadic border clashes with

7128-400: The bank's entrance on the Boulevard de Berlaimont; and two bronze statues of kneeling women, respectively by George Grard on the southern side and Charles Leplae  [ nl ] to the north. In 2023, the National Bank announced plans for comprehensive renovation of its head office complex, on a design by firms KAAN Architecten  [ nl ] and LOW Architecten, combined with

7236-405: The capital Nanking in December 1937. After the fall of Nanking, tens or hundreds of thousands of Chinese civilians and disarmed combatants were murdered by the Japanese . In March 1938, Nationalist Chinese forces won their first major victory at Taierzhuang , but then the city of Xuzhou was taken by the Japanese in May. In June 1938, Chinese forces stalled the Japanese advance by flooding

7344-400: The closure of the Belgian Banking Commission and the entrusting of prudential supervision to the National Bank, while the Financial Services and Markets Authority was created to take over the oversight of market integrity and conduct-of-business regulation. The printing works of the National Bank closed its doors in August 2020, and the building that hosted them in the center of Brussels

7452-403: The conflict well into 1941. In December 1940, Roosevelt accused Hitler of planning world conquest and ruled out any negotiations as useless, calling for the United States to become an " arsenal of democracy " and promoting Lend-Lease programmes of military and humanitarian aid to support the British war effort; Lend-Lease was later extended to the other Allies, including the Soviet Union after it

7560-465: The construction of a cash logistics center in Zellik , an outer northwestern suburb of Brussels. In 1982, the National Bank opened its own museum in the Hôtel du Gouverneur . In 2018, the museum moved to new premises in the former 1872 headquarters of the Union du Crédit de Bruxelles , a cooperative bank, which the National Bank had purchased in 1979 and renovated in the 2000s. The National Bank used to maintain branches and offices throughout

7668-413: The country as well as Luxembourg , reaching a total of 43 locations between 1936 and 1974. The branch in Antwerp was an opulent eclectic building designed by Hendrik Beyaert, the architect of the bank's main office in Brussels, and completed in 1879. Most of these branches included a discount office ( French : comptoir d'escompte ), technically a separate entity owned by local individuals which acted as

7776-526: The creation of a " New Roman Empire ". Adolf Hitler , after an unsuccessful attempt to overthrow the German government in 1923, eventually became the Chancellor of Germany in 1933 when Paul von Hindenburg and the Reichstag appointed him. Following Hindenburg's death in 1934, Hitler proclaimed himself Führer of Germany and abolished democracy, espousing a radical, racially motivated revision of

7884-506: The demise of the CBFA and a reform of financial supervisory architecture, enshrined in legislation of 2 July 2010. As a result, Belgium adopted the so-called Twin Peaks model in which prudential supervision of banks and insurers is separated from the conduct-of-business supervision of a range of financial professionals, firms and markets. On 1 April 2011, the CBFA's former prudential mandate went to

7992-757: The dissolution of the Austro-Hungarian, Ottoman, and Russian Empires. To prevent a future world war, the League of Nations was established in 1920 by the Paris Peace Conference . The organisation's primary goals were to prevent armed conflict through collective security, military, and naval disarmament , as well as settling international disputes through peaceful negotiations and arbitration. Despite strong pacifist sentiment after World War   I , irredentist and revanchist nationalism had emerged in several European states. These sentiments were especially marked in Germany because of

8100-712: The end of May completed the German conquest of the Balkans. Partisan warfare subsequently broke out against the Axis occupation of Yugoslavia , which continued until the end of the war. In the Middle East in May, Commonwealth forces quashed an uprising in Iraq which had been supported by German aircraft from bases within Vichy-controlled Syria . Between June and July, British-led forces invaded and occupied

8208-511: The end of the war. World War II changed the political alignment and social structure of the world, and it set the foundation of international relations for the rest of the 20th century and into the 21st century. The United Nations was established to foster international cooperation and prevent conflicts, with the victorious great powers—China, France, the Soviet Union, the UK, and the US—becoming

8316-631: The first step of what its government saw as the country's right to rule Asia , staged the Mukden incident as a pretext to invade Manchuria and establish the puppet state of Manchukuo . China appealed to the League of Nations to stop the Japanese invasion of Manchuria. Japan withdrew from the League of Nations after being condemned for its incursion into Manchuria. The two nations then fought several battles, in Shanghai , Rehe and Hebei , until

8424-864: The former Chinese imperial capital of Peking after instigating the Marco Polo Bridge incident , which culminated in the Japanese campaign to invade all of China. The Soviets quickly signed a non-aggression pact with China to lend materiel support, effectively ending China's prior cooperation with Germany . From September to November, the Japanese attacked Taiyuan , engaged the Kuomintang Army around Xinkou , and fought Communist forces in Pingxingguan . Generalissimo Chiang Kai-shek deployed his best army to defend Shanghai , but after three months of fighting, Shanghai fell. The Japanese continued to push Chinese forces back, capturing

8532-525: The invasion of the Ethiopian Empire (also known as Abyssinia ) by the armed forces of the Kingdom of Italy ( Regno d'Italia ), which was launched from Italian Somaliland and Eritrea . The war resulted in the military occupation of Ethiopia and its annexation into the newly created colony of Italian East Africa ( Africa Orientale Italiana , or AOI); in addition it exposed the weakness of

8640-488: The outbreak of World War I , minister of Finance Michel Levie ordered the National Bank to send its reserve assets to London. In retaliation, the German occupier force withdrew the National Bank's issuing privileges by decree of 20 November 1914, and entrusted it to the SGB instead. The SGB, however, still used the National Bank's printing presses. Once the war was over, the National Bank regained its issuing privileges. During

8748-502: The permanent members of its security council . The Soviet Union and the United States emerged as rival superpowers , setting the stage for the Cold War . In the wake of European devastation, the influence of its great powers waned, triggering the decolonisation of Africa and Asia . Most countries whose industries had been damaged moved towards economic recovery and expansion . World War II began in Europe on 1 September 1939 with

8856-589: The political European map with the defeat of the Central Powers —including Austria-Hungary , Germany , Bulgaria , and the Ottoman Empire —and the 1917 Bolshevik seizure of power in Russia , which led to the founding of the Soviet Union. Meanwhile, the victorious Allies of World War I , such as France, Belgium, Italy, Romania, and Greece, gained territory, and new nation-states were created out of

8964-599: The port of Tobruk . By late March 1941, Bulgaria and Yugoslavia signed the Tripartite Pact ; however, the Yugoslav government was overthrown two days later by pro-British nationalists. Germany and Italy responded with simultaneous invasions of both Yugoslavia and Greece , commencing on 6 April 1941; both nations were forced to surrender within the month. The airborne invasion of the Greek island of Crete at

9072-411: The postwar period, more emphasis was gradually placed on parity of status between French and Dutch. The acronyms CBF and CBFA were specifically construed so as to be identical in the two languages. The Banking Commission was established in 1935, at the time one of the first independent banking supervisory agencies in the world - in other countries, to the extent that banking supervision existed at all, it

9180-753: The public on 2 November 1936 as the National Bank's Luxembourg office ( French : agence ), was elevated in 1963 to the status of branch ( French : succursale ), then closed on 31 December 1998 after the creation of the Central Bank of Luxembourg (BCL) had made it redundant. The BCL acquired the building on 8 May 2001 and had it demolished in 2003 to erect a new facility known as the Monterey Building, inaugurated in 2007. The National Bank gradually shed its network of branches from 1974 onward, as they no longer served an operational purpose. The prominent Antwerp branch closed on 30 September 2013, and

9288-569: The relocation of the last third, or 200 tons, to France. The gold was shipped from Ostend to Bordeaux and taken in custody by the Bank of France . With the advance of German troops, the latter further moved the National Bank's gold in early June 1940 to Lorient , a military port. The National Bank wanted the gold to be transported from there to the United States, but the French Navy shipped it instead to Dakar , where it landed on 28 June 1940 and

9396-722: The remainder of Czechoslovakia and subsequently split it into the German Protectorate of Bohemia and Moravia and a pro-German client state , the Slovak Republic . Hitler also delivered an ultimatum to Lithuania on 20 March 1939, forcing the concession of the Klaipėda Region , formerly the German Memelland . Greatly alarmed and with Hitler making further demands on the Free City of Danzig ,

9504-410: The significant territorial, colonial, and financial losses imposed by the Treaty of Versailles . Under the treaty, Germany lost around 13 percent of its home territory and all its overseas possessions , while German annexation of other states was prohibited, reparations were imposed, and limits were placed on the size and capability of the country's armed forces . The German Empire was dissolved in

9612-498: The start or prelude to World War II. The exact date of the war's end also is not universally agreed upon. It was generally accepted at the time that the war ended with the armistice of 15 August 1945 ( V-J Day ), rather than with the formal surrender of Japan on 2 September 1945, which officially ended the war in Asia . A peace treaty between Japan and the Allies was signed in 1951. A 1990 treaty regarding Germany's future allowed

9720-593: The strong Maginot Line fortifications on the Franco-German border, Germany directed its attack at the neutral nations of Belgium , the Netherlands , and Luxembourg . The Germans carried out a flanking manoeuvre through the Ardennes region, which was mistakenly perceived by the Allies as an impenetrable natural barrier against armoured vehicles. By successfully implementing new Blitzkrieg tactics,

9828-585: The two wars became World War II in 1941. Other proposed starting dates for World War II include the Italian invasion of Abyssinia on 3 October 1935. The British historian Antony Beevor views the beginning of World War   II as the Battles of Khalkhin Gol fought between Japan and the forces of Mongolia and the Soviet Union from May to September 1939. Others view the Spanish Civil War as

9936-513: The war were not fulfilled in the peace settlement. From 1922 to 1925, the Fascist movement led by Benito Mussolini seized power in Italy with a nationalist, totalitarian , and class collaborationist agenda that abolished representative democracy, repressed socialist, left-wing, and liberal forces, and pursued an aggressive expansionist foreign policy aimed at making Italy a world power, promising

10044-475: The war. Germany annexed western Poland and occupied central Poland ; the Soviet Union annexed eastern Poland ; small shares of Polish territory were transferred to Lithuania and Slovakia . On 6 October, Hitler made a public peace overture to the United Kingdom and France but said that the future of Poland was to be determined exclusively by Germany and the Soviet Union. The proposal was rejected and Hitler ordered an immediate offensive against France, which

10152-512: The west halted the German advance for several days, but it was outflanked and encircled by the Wehrmacht . Remnants of the Polish army broke through to besieged Warsaw . On 17 September 1939, two days after signing a cease-fire with Japan , the Soviet Union invaded Poland under the supposed pretext that the Polish state had ceased to exist. On 27 September, the Warsaw garrison surrendered to

10260-404: The whole building completed in 1874 and interior decoration finishing in 1878. That building was subsequently repurposed as the formal apartment of the National Bank's governor until 1957, and is still known as the Hôtel du Gouverneur . The ground floor and first floor of the Hôtel du Gouverneur are still preserved in a state close to that in the 1870s and are used by the National Bank as

10368-707: The world order , and soon began a massive rearmament campaign . France, seeking to secure its alliance with Italy, allowed Italy a free hand in Ethiopia , which Italy desired as a colonial possession. The situation was aggravated in early 1935 when the Territory of the Saar Basin was legally reunited with Germany, and Hitler repudiated the Treaty of Versailles, accelerated his rearmament programme, and introduced conscription. The United Kingdom, France and Italy formed

10476-614: Was invaded by Germany. The United States started strategic planning to prepare for a full-scale offensive against Germany. At the end of September 1940, the Tripartite Pact formally united Japan, Italy, and Germany as the Axis powers . The Tripartite Pact stipulated that any country—with the exception of the Soviet Union—that attacked any Axis Power would be forced to go to war against all three. The Axis expanded in November 1940 when Hungary , Slovakia , and Romania joined. Romania and Hungary later made major contributions to

10584-462: Was a global conflict between two coalitions: the Allies and the Axis powers . Nearly all the world's countries —including all the great powers —participated, with many investing all available economic, industrial, and scientific capabilities in pursuit of total war , blurring the distinction between military and civilian resources. Tanks and aircraft played major roles , with the latter enabling

10692-549: Was created by Minister Walthère Frère-Orban in 1850 with a unique hybrid status: in the form of a limited company, but with the main objective to carry out missions of general interest entrusted to it by legislation of 5 May 1850, including replacing the Société Générale de Belgique (SGB) as fiscal agent of the Belgian government. It came from a protracted process of negotiation with the Société Générale and

10800-676: Was exercised either by a specialized office in the ministry of finance , or by an arm of the central bank . Under the German occupation of Belgium during World War II , a separate German-run Office of Banking Control operated in parallel with the Banking Commission, which was deprived of any authority over German banks operating in Belgium. The mandate of the Commission was gradually broadened to control of mutual funds, then corporate securities offerings in 1964, holding companies in 1967, and private savings banks in 1975. In 1990,

10908-565: Was initially located on the Rue Royale/Koningsstraat , at the corner of what is now the Rue du Moniteur / Staatsbladsstraat , in a building that is no longer extant. In 1859, it acquired properties on the nearby Rue du Bois Sauvage / Wildewoudstraat , and commissioned architects Hendrik Beyaert and Wynand Janssens  [ nl ] to design a new building. Construction work started in 1860, with sections opened in 1865,

11016-407: Was part-nationalized following the end of World War II. Unlike the cases of the Bank of England and Bank of France , both of which were fully nationalized, the Belgian government left the National Bank's prior private-sector shareholders in ownership of half of its equity. Following the turmoil that affected Fortis and Dexia in late 2008, an overhaul of financial regulation in Belgium led to

11124-456: Was postponed until the spring of 1940 due to bad weather. After the outbreak of war in Poland, Stalin threatened Estonia , Latvia , and Lithuania with military invasion, forcing the three Baltic countries to sign pacts allowing the creation of Soviet military bases in these countries; in October 1939, significant Soviet military contingents were moved there. Finland refused to sign

11232-772: Was repulsed with heavy Italian casualties; the campaign ended within months with minor territorial changes. To assist Italy and prevent Britain from gaining a foothold, Germany prepared to invade the Balkans, which would threaten Romanian oil fields and strike against British dominance of the Mediterranean. In December 1940, British Empire forces began counter-offensives against Italian forces in Egypt and Italian East Africa . The offensives were successful; by early February 1941, Italy had lost control of eastern Libya, and large numbers of Italian troops had been taken prisoner. The Italian Navy also suffered significant defeats, with

11340-673: Was required to go through the bureaucracy of the League of Nations, which rendered it essentially toothless. The United States, concerned with events in Europe and Asia, passed the Neutrality Act in August of the same year. Hitler defied the Versailles and Locarno Treaties by remilitarising the Rhineland in March 1936, encountering little opposition due to the policy of appeasement . In October 1936, Germany and Italy formed

11448-615: Was sold in 2021. Since then, the BNB no longer prints euro banknotes itself. At the end of 2020, the Bank had 1,680 full-time equivalent workers. In September 2022, the quotation of the NBB stock was suspended after its stock price collapsed due to information that the bank would make losses as a consequences of the abrupt interest rates hikes decided by the European Central Bank. Despite these losses, there are currently no plans for

11556-551: Was subsequently converted into commercial offices. The last two branches, in Kortrijk and Liège , were closed in 2018. (List to be expanded) [REDACTED] Media related to Belgian National Bank at Wikimedia Commons World War II Asia-Pacific Mediterranean and Middle East Other campaigns Coups World War II or the Second World War (1 September 1939 – 2 September 1945)

11664-639: Was subsequently moved inland to Kayes in present-day Mali . In late 1940, collaborationist French Prime Minister Pierre Laval decided to hand over the National Bank's gold to the Reichsbank ; the gold eventually reached Berlin in May 1942, via French Algeria and Marseille , and was melted into new ingots with false year marks at the Reichsmünze . On 5 February 1941, the London-based National Bank under Theunis's leadership sued

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