Eritrea’s early stages in monetary and banking

development

ARNALDO MAURI

Working Paper n. 28.2003 - Ottobre

Dipartimento di Economia Politica e Aziendale

Università degli Studi di Milano
via Conservatorio, 7
20122 Milano
tel. ++39/02/50321501
fax ++39/02/50321450
E Mail: dipeco@unimi.it
 Arnaldo Mauri

ERITREA’S EARLY STAGES IN MONETARY AND BANKING

DEVELOPMENT

Abstract

Eritrea is listed among those countries of Africa, whose

independence has been lately achieved. Notwithstanding the monetary
and banking history of Eritrea goes back to the Italian colonial
settlement on the Red Sea shore of 19th century. The paper offers an
overview of the early stages of the Colony’s monetary development up
to mid-thirties and of the problems met in the substitution of Italian
currency for the traditional money. A branch of the Bank of Italy was
established in Asmara in 1914 and this event marked the first
introduction of banking into the country. The Asmara branch was
followed by branch offices of the Italian central bank in the four main
centres of the Colony. The Bank of Italy was involved also in
commercial banking and fulfilled the functions of banker and fiscal
agent for the colonial government as well. Furthermore it worked to
promote the creation of local banks and the take-off of the Eritrean
banking system. Due attention is given to attempts of the colonial
government to develop a suitable agricultural credit system in Eritrea
and to the critical issues involved.

Keywords:
Eritrea, Financial Development, African Banking

JEL classification: E 42, G 21, N 27.

1
 1.Introduction

Eritrea has achieved independence in the spring of 1993, following

a referendum sponsored by United Nations, and is therefore one of the
newest African nations. This country is located in the Horn of Africa
and occupies a strategic position along the Red Sea western coast being
bordered, on the landside, to the north and west by Sudan, to the south
by Ethiopia and to the south-east by Djibouti. Coast line by the Red Sea
is 1,151 km. and together with Dahlack Archipelago is 2,234 km. Total
land area is 121,143 km sq (a little more than Northern Italy) and the
population is estimated approximately 3.5 million. The region, through
the centuries, has been settled and controlled by various immigrants and
invaders, but the most significant contribution to the rise of the nation as
a distinct society and territory was made by the Italian colonization.
“Eritrea” is, in fact, the name first given to this country by Italians after
the Mare Erythraeum (Red Sea) of the Romans. Eritrean identity and
national consciousness, in fact, gradually matured during this era.
The main events, which may be adopted as dividing Eritrean
monetary and banking history into periods, are six. The first event was
the Italian preliminary settling on the coastline at Assab in 1869. The
second event was the establishment, in 1914, of a branch of the Bank of
Italy in Asmara, marking the advent of banking in Eritrea, at that time
the whole country being under Italian colonial rule. The third event was,
in 1936, the Italian war against Ethiopia, when Eritrea was elected the
main base for launching the invasion into the neighbour country. After
the conquest of Ethiopia, a broad colonial banking network, extended to
encompass all Italian possessions in the Horn of Africa (Eritrea,
Ethiopia and Somalia) and closely linked with the metropolitan financial
system, was created (Mauri 1967). By the end of the thirties Eritrea, at
that time one of the six provinces of Italian East Africa (Africa Orientale
Italiana), was referred among the most industrialised African areas south
of Sahara (Infante 1948).
The fourth event was the collapse of the Italian colonial power during
World War II in 1941, when Eritrea came under British military
administration and was ruled as “occupied enemy territory”. The East
African shilling was enforced as sole legal-tender money and the
Barclays Bank settled in the country with two branch offices (Asmara,
June 1941 and Massawa, April 1942). British temporary administration
lasted, however, for more than eleven years. The fifth event was, in
1952, the federation of Eritrea, as an autonomous state, with Ethiopia

2
under the sovereignty of Ethiopian crown, following a recommendation
by the United Nations (Zewde 1991). British bankers left, their business
was transferred to the State Bank of Ethiopia and Eritrea was fully
included into the Ethiopian monetary and banking system (Caselli and
Mauri 1986). After a decade Ethiopia, by unilateral decision, annexed
Eritrea as a simple province and that infelicitous move started the thirty-
year liberation struggle of the whole Eritrean people. Finally, the sixth
event was the achievement of independence by Eritrea in 1993, followed
by the birth of an independent Eritrean monetary and banking system.
This paper is designate to present a synthesis of the basic problems
and developments of the monetary and credit system of Eritrea during
the two first periods of Eritrean banking history. The terminal date of the
study is October 1935, when the Italian army started the invasion of
Ethiopia. The remainder of the paper is organised as follows. Section 2
deals with the establishment of the Colony of Eritrea by the Italians.
Section 3 gives an overview of the monetary setting in Eritrea and the
problems involved. Sections 4 and 5 focus on landing of the Bank of
Italy in the Colony and on coming into use of banknotes. Sections 6 and
7 describe the emergence and the structures of various types of banks
and the following banking crisis. Section 8 concentrates on issues
related to agricultural credit such as land tenure, legislation, financial
institutions, demand and supply of funds, operations of specialized
agricultural lenders. The paper ends with a summary of the findings and
some concluding remarks in Section 9.

2. The Colony of Eritrea

In 1890 the Italians grouped together various territories along the

Red Sea western coast under their possession into the Colony of Eritrea.
Through the centuries Arabs, Portuguese, Turks and Egyptians had ruled
this coast, but all attempts to penetrate inland had been unsuccessful
because of the harsh nature of the territory and the warlike spirit of the
inhabitants.
The Italian settling in this area had begun 1869 with the purchase
of a piece of coastline in the Danakil country from a local sultan by the
Rubattino steamship company at a price of 6,000 Maria Theresa thalers.
This acquisition had been transferred in 1882 by the Compagnia
Generale di Navigazione Italiana, set up by a merger of the Rubattino

3
with the Florio Company, to the Italian state in order to obtain military
protection. Italian troops were landed on the Red Sea shore and, with
British consent, in 1885 also took possession of the port of Massawa,
following the agreed withdrawal of the Egyptian garrison and the
recruitment of the indigenous irregular soldiers previously in the pay of
the Khedive.
In the following years the Italians penetrated up to the highland
plateau densely populated with the excuse of protecting their possession
from the periodic raids. As a third step, the occupation of the north-
western territories had been carried out after a series of clashes with the
Mahadist forces. Eventually the advance of the Italians towards the
South was halted in 1896 at Adwa by Menelek’s Ethiopian army,
resulting in the bloodiest battle even fought in all the African colonial
wars (Zewde 1991).
Italy, even after the opening of Suez Canal, did not have any real
relevant strategic interest to safeguard in this remote African region as,
instead, it did later with Libya. Also economic interest in exploiting
these territories and in giving a destination to a large flow of emigrants,
appeared to be doubtful even in a long term outlook (Rochat 1974).
Apparently Italy was drawn into this first unlucky venture, a naïve move
in the dramatic scene of the “scramble for Africa”, by the inexperience
and the unreasonable ambitions of its political leaders at the time when
national unity was still an uneasy target to achieve (Riosa 1998). The
Italian settlement in Eritrea was also, to some extent, the result of a
subtle two-edged British strategy aiming, on the one hand, to quelling
the Mahdi’s Sudan rebellion and, on the other, at containing French
expansion towards the upper reaches of the Nile (Labanca 2002).

3. The Monetary Setting

The Italian Administration found the monetary situation in Eritrea

to be not unlike that reigning in the neighbouring territories. The Maria
Theresa thaler, a silver coin (0.8333 fine) minted in Austria, was widely
used for domestic trade as well as for trade with Ethiopia and the
opposite side of the Red Sea, even though introduction of this
commodity money into territories under Ottoman rule was unlawful. The
Maria Theresa thaler was a general purpose full-bodied money, used as
means for trade as well as for unilateral payments: tributes,
compensations for killing and injury, as pointed out by Grierson (1977),

4
and gifts (Drake 1980). According to Pankhurst (1965) and other
authors the Austrian coin besides its use as money, i.e. means of
payment, standard of value and store of value, also preformed important
non-monetary functions: in fact it served as jewel, as a certified source
of silver for melting down and even as a measure of weight (28.0668
grams). Inland the colony, exchanges were carried on also by barter or
by the use of commodity money. Alongside Maria Theresa thalers
various types of primitive money served for payments (Einzig 1966)
such as salt bars (amolie), cloth, cattle, cartridges, brass bracelets and
glass beads (Alamanni 1891).
The circulation of Egyptian currency was concentrated in the
Massawa area, formerly under Egyptian control, where this money had
been officially enforced. Indian rupees, brought in from Aden, were
known in the Assab area. These foreign coins, after Italian occupation,
were easily replaced by Italian currency, but the use of the latter
remained limited, for the most part, to the urban centres. The Maria
Theresa thaler continued to be the principal medium of exchange in the
Colony, but this money was not flanked by fractional coins and
therefore small Italian pieces became quite popular among the natives
(Carboneri 1912).
From the outset, Italian colonial authorities had regarded the
Austrian silver coin with notable disfavour (Pankhurst 1965) but
nevertheless they accepted the status quo and, in order not to disturb
local trade and the trade with Ethiopia and the countries bordering the
Red Sea, rejected the idea of transplanting immediately the metropolitan
monetary system into Eritrea (Cora 1913). Maria Theresa thalers in large
quantities were therefore imported and stocked for the needs of the
colonial government. Given that a 1.5 percent brassage had to be paid to
the Austrians for minting the coins, the government of Rome tried to
obtain from Vienna, in 1887, the authorization to mint these coins at
home, arguing that Maria Theresa thalers were no longer legal tender
and the Austrians were minting these coins also for private parties
(Tschoegl 2001). The dies were already in Italian hands in the mints of
Milan and Venice as heritage of the ceased Habsburgs rule in Lombardy
and Venetia (Caroselli 1941). The answer of Vienna being negative
however, the Italians, concerned about their relations with such a
powerful and touchy neighbour, eventually turned to the idea of minting
themselves a new silver coin similar to the Maria Theresa thaler.
An autonomous colonial monetary system, closely tied to the
Italian lira, was thus created in 1890. This system was based on the

5
tallero eritreo (Eritrean thaler), a coin with 0.800 silver content, flanked
by three fractional denominations, also in silver: a four tenths of a
tallero (two lire piece), a two tenths (a lira piece) and a one tenth ( 50
cents of lira piece). The coinage act envisaged also two denominations
in bronze, but these pieces were never put into circulation since the five
and ten cents pieces of lira had already gained acceptance (Rossetti
1914). The Italian mints produced on the whole 200.000 silver coins
(600,000 talleri’s worth of lira at the official conversion ratio) between
1890 and 1896 (Tschoegl 2001).
The Eritrean monetary system was tied to the national currency by
making the tallero equal to five Italian lire. In this way a difficult
monetary situation arose in the Colony. The incomplete silver standard
system, based on the Maria Theresa thaler (a full bodied money) was
faced by a system, which, although using a token money made of silver
(i.e. the tallero eritreo) as monetary unit, was actually based on gold
(gold standard)). As a consequence, the exchange rate between the two
silver coins was not fixed and linked to the bullion content as one
would expect, but was fluctuating over the time following changes in the
world demand for silver and in the market price of this metal (Petazzi
1911).
This monetary innovation brought in by the Italians was not a
success because the natives could not figure out why the tallero eritreo,
similar in appearance to the Maria Theresa thaler, but with slightly
lower silver content (0.800 rather than 0.8333), should have an official
value much greater. Therefore the tallero eritreo seemed to be a fraud
and was referred as the “bad thaler”, opposed. to the “good thaler”, i.e.
the Austrian silver coin. Eventually, the failure of the tallero eritreo
was recognised by the Italian government, which decided to stop
minting this coin in 1896 and to withdraw and melt, in 1898, silver
pieces for a total value of 3 million lire.
The serious shortage of Maria Theresa thalers during World War I
and the consequent rise in value of these coins suggested Italian
government trying another way taking into due account the criticisms on
the tallero eritreo. Accordingly, in 1918, a new silver coin was opted
for, denominated tallero d’Italia (thaler of Italy), which resembled as
closely as possible the Maria Theresa thaler in all its details, including
that of being a full bodied money, completely independent of the Italian
monetary system (Mariani 1918). The mintage was free, just as with the
Maria Theresa thaler, and furthermore its silver content was higher this
time ((0.835 fine). The new Italian thalers, like the Austrian coins, were

6
entitled to circulate alongside the metropolitan currency, but without a
fixed exchange rate. In fact, the value of the new coin, as well as the
value of the Maria Theresa thaler, was allowed to fluctuate following the
price of silver.
In spite of its beauty and proper requisites, the tallero d’Italia, at
first, was not easily accepted by the natives because of their
conservatism (it differed in some details crucial for them) and because
it could not be used for trade with bordering countries (Pankhurst,
1965). The Italian authorities, from their part, did not persevere in this
direction, as they perhaps should have done. In the meantime their views
on this matter had changed and the new policy was to encourage the use
of metropolitan currency in the Colony. The mint therefore produced
only 550,000 pieces of the Italian thaler on the whole (Pollera 1926).

4. The Bank of Italy lands in Eritrea

The first bank to be established in Eritrea was a branch of the Bank

of Italy, whose home office was in Rome, but this important event
occurred many years after the first Italian settlement in the Horn of
Africa and after the founding of the Colony of Eritrea. Appeals and
petitions to have banking services in Eritrea made repeatedly both by the
Italian and other foreign business communities residing in the Colony
were not given due attention in Rome for some decades. In 1885 Hassan
Moussa el Akad, an Egyptian businessman, had submitted to the Italian
authorities a project for the creation of a bank which would provide both
commercial loans and mortgage loans. However the request was turned
down by the Italian authorities in order not to create difficulties with the
Foreign Office in London since, according to information obtained, the
Egyptian banker appeared to be involved in an anti-British movement in
his country (Mauri 1967). Having lost this occasion, more than a quarter
of a century was to pass before a bank office was established in the
colony.
The vacuum due to the absence of institutional sources of credit
was filled to some extent by informal finance, namely moneylenders,
pawnbrokers and indigenous savings and credit associations (iqqubs and
iddirs). Almost no details of the beginnings of these activities both in
Eritrea as well as in the neighbour Ethiopia are known (Mauri 1967,
Begashaw 1978, Aredo 1993). In Eritrea traders and moneylenders

7
granted loans both to Italian settlers and to natives, whilst businessmen
resorted to financial services of banks operating outside the Colony, in
Italy or in other countries (Santagata 1935).
In these circumstances the Italian Postal Administration played a
crucial role, in deposit taking through checking accounts as well as in
the payment and money transfer services, but this institution however
was not in a position to provide credit. Postal financial services were
offered through a network, in continual expansion, which, at the
beginning of the 20th century, was served by offices in Asmara,
Massawa, Assab, Keren, Adi Keyih, Agordat, Adi Ugri and Segeneyti.
The service of payments and money transfer at distance did not only
regard Italy and the Italian possessions, but also other European
countries and their African and Asian possessions, following
international agreements (Mauri 1980). In Eritrea efforts were made to
develop the collection of postal savings and the results achieved were
encouraging, but regarded the natives to only a small extent. The postal
savings passbooks increased in number from 595 at the end of 1886 to
11,933 by the end of the century and 16,309 by 1909 for a total amount
of over 7 million lire.
To overcome the shortage of credit and to meet the pressing
demand for a supply of a comprehensive range of banking services, the
colonial authorities requested, trough the Ministry of Foreign Affairs in
Rome (responsible at that time also for colonial affairs) a direct
intervention in Eritrea by the Banca d’Italia. The Italian central bank
was to be free to effect in the Eritrean Colony all the operations which
customarily pertain to banks of issue as well as commerial banking
operations. The Bank of Italy, at first, manifested its interest in
principle, but added that the implementation of the project would have
required a series of procedural steps. Accordingly, in 1906, following
proposal by the Board of Directors, a shareholders meeting of the Bank
of Italy voted in favour of opening an Eritrean branch and a mission was
sent to Asmara to make a feasibility study of the project (Tuccimei
1998). The conclusion, however, was not encouraging.
First of all, there was no evidence of initiatives of this kind by
central banks of countries having colonial empires. Secondly, the
Eritrean branch to be established would have found difficult to become
viable in the space of few years, even if it was to handle the treasury
service for the colonial government. Thirdly local authorities appeared
to be unable and/or unwilling to grant public contributions to the Bank
of Italy branch. Last but not least, there were serious difficulties of legal

8
and regulatory nature owing both to the lack of specific provisions
regarding banking business within the commercial legislation
framework of the Colony and to administrative constraints set up by the
Banca d’Italia’s statute and by the rigid regulations drawn up within the
bank itself (Tuccimei 1998). In conclusion, conditions in which the
Bank of Italy would have been called to operate in Eritrea were entirely
and significantly different from those usual in the Italian context.
Therefore no wonder that the establishment of a Bank of Italy branch in
Asmara remained an issue of studies and discussions for the next few
years without any concrete development.
The idea of direct intervention by the Italian central bank fallen
through, the colonial authorities turned to private commercial banks and,
in 1909, started negotiations with the Banco di Roma. This bank had
adopted a policy of expansion of its branch network on the southern and
eastern coasts of the Mediterranean and appeared to be interested in
establishing branch offices in the Red Sea area as well (de Rosa 1982).
The bank’s management, however, concerned about scarcity of local
business opportunities, stipulated, as an essential condition, that to the
Eritrean branch office should be entrusted the function of fiscal agent of
the colonial government. Banco di Roma maintained that, in the absence
of public grants, only in handling this service would it achieve a
minimum operational size to be fully viable. Unfortunately the Ministry
of the Treasury in Rome, when approached on the matter, categorically
excluded that this service could be entrusted to a private institution
(Mauri 1967).
Given that Italian banks were not interested in settling in the Horn
of Africa, a good solution could have been found if the Bank of
Abyssinia had been created on Italian initiative, because in this event it
would have been permitted to open offices and to operate under
conditions of monopoly everywhere in Eritrea. However, the acquisition
of the control of the bank by the British from the outset had made this
solution unworkable. It was in fact a request by the Bank of Abyssinia to
open branch offices in Eritrea in order to develop trade with Ethiopia,
which stirred up the Italian government and broke the stalemate (Zervos
1936, Mauri 1967). The Bank of Italy was, accordingly, asked once
again, and this time with greater insistence, to change its mind on
establishing branches abroad.
The Italian central bank had already granted loans to the
government of the Colony for public works and had coordinated a
banking consortium to finance the construction of railways in Eritrea.

9
The consortium encompassed also other Italian financial institutions.
Partners in this venture were: Banco di Napoli, Cassa di Risparmio delle
Provincie Lombarde, Banca Commerciale Italiana, Credito Italiano,
Società Bancaria Italiana and Banco di Roma (Banca d’Italia 1940). The
Bank of Italy, this time, could not refuse the invitation because the
legislative obstacles, which formerly had appeared insurmountable, no
longer existed.
After Italy had acquired Tripolitania and Cyrenaica, previously
under Turkish rule, the problem of colonial credit could no longer be
postponed. An ad hoc law in 1911 had authorized the three Italian banks
of issue (i.e. Banca d’Italia, Banco di Napoli and Banco di Sicilia) to
settle in the colonies with the permission to operate under a special
regime, gaining conditions of greater flexibility. Accordingly, the statute
and the internal regulations of the Bank of Italy were conveniently
amended and obstacles, which had halted in 1906 the Eritrean project,
were removed. Under the new legal and regulatory framework the
colonial branches of the Italian central bank were allowed to follow
procedures and to carry out operations, which were forbidden to the
metropolitan branches, provided these new operational rules were more
adapted to the economic and social context in the colonies. Therefore,
authorisation was given for all kinds of operations of commercial
banking (Mauri 1967). Furthermore for the whole range of financial
products offered to customers it was permitted to apply contractual
terms and interest rates different from those applied domestically and
which varied also from territory to territory in the colonial possessions.
As a result of this new approach, the first bank to be established in
Eritrea was a branch of the Bank of Italy.
A branch office of the Bank of Italy was inaugurated in Asmara on
February 2nd, 1914, set up with autonomous capital, and a sub-office
was opened, on April 15th of the same year, in Massawa, the main port
of the Colony on the Red Sea. Among the instructions issued at the
beginning by the General Manager of the Bank of Italy to the Eritrean
offices are remembered (Tuccimei 1998):
(a) maintain good working relations with the Bank of Abyssinia of
the neighbour country;
(b) facilitate the placing of reliable people in the principal client
firms of the bank;
(c) visit periodically the various urban centres of the colony where
the bank has actual or potential customers in order to help decisions on
times and places for opening successfully new sub-offices.

10
 Besides these guidelines it should be mentioned that the
management of the Italian central bank had in mind the design to
transform, in due time, the Eritrean branch into a new independent
financial institution of the Colony.
The newly established Banca d’Italia branch rendered important
services to the economy. It began operations of commercial banking and
fulfilled the functions of banker, fiscal agent and adviser of the colonial
government as well. To the Bank was also entrusted the administration
of imported Maria Theresa thalers. The Bank of Italy was lending to
business against stock-in-trade and against movement of goods. For
advances on pledge, initially merchandise had to be stored in the
Customs warehouses, but later the Bank opened a bonded warehouse in
Massawa. A collateral security margin of 40% was required for
advances on commodities (Tuccimei 1998). Among the deposit
collecting operations were current accounts, both non-interest bearing
and interest bearing (with the rate of 2.5%) and savings deposits at 3%
rate. The Bank of Italy also issued certificates of deposits with 3-month,
6-month and one year maturity terms, bearing interest rates of 3%, 3.5%
and 4% respectively. The dependence upon the main office in Rome
enabled the Banca d’Italia’s Eritrean branch to gain immediately the
confidence of customers and provide a full range of services which, at
that time, would have been impossible for a local independent credit
institution. However the working procedures were perceived as
bureaucratic by some customers.
The Eritrean economy experienced a period of considerable growth
following, in 1914, the outbreak of World War I. The exports-led
economic development required adequate investments in the Colony and
a greater supply of credit and banking facilities. The Eritrean branch of
the Bank of Italy was flexible enough in operations and increased
promptly the supply of credit in response to expanded opportunities for
lending. It enlarged its initial branch office network (Asmara and
Massawa) with the opening, as from 1917, of sub-offices in two caravan
centres (Keren and Adi Keyih) and in Assab, port on the Red Sea in the
South of the Colony.
The Bank of Italy in Eritrea was involved in insurance business as
well. It performed functions of agent for two outstanding Italian
insurance companies: the Istituto Nazionale delle Assicurazioni and the
Assicurazioni Generali (Tuccimei 1998).

11
 5. The Circulation of Banknotes.

Very important was the role in the Bank of Italy in promoting the
use of paper money, even bearing in mind that the backwardness of the
Colony was certainly not a factor which could help expansion in note
circulation. From as early as 1885 there had been the first consignment
of notes by Banca Nazionale del Regno d’Italia (which in 1893 would
become Banca d’Italia following the merger with other banks) to the
Cassa Militare of Massawa for a total of 70,000 lire (Mauri 1967).
Military headquarters had, however, informed the Ministry of Treasury
that the circulation of the Italian notes was meeting serious difficulties
in Eritrea because it was not easy to persuade the natives to accept token
money made of paper. The communication had had the effect of
bringing about a suspension of the dispatch of notes. This episode is
eloquent enough in illustrating how Italy was unprepared to handle
colonial affairs when it was driven to this first adventure in the Horn of
Africa.
Three years later the Treasury had made a second delivery of
banknotes for a total of 600,000 lire. These included Banca Nazionale
del Regno d’Italia notes for two thirds of the total and Banco di Napoli
notes for one third. The Banco di Napoli notes had been included
following complaints of this bank of southern Italy to be discriminated
in favour of the Banca Nazionale del Regno d’Italia. The Banco di
Napoli notes, however, were returned to Italy few months later by the
military headquarters in Massawa, which had pointed out the
inopportuneness of increasing heterogeneity of the medium of exchange
circulating in the colony and thereby frustrating the efforts made to
dispel the diffidence of the natives towards the Italian currency (Mauri
1967). With the passing of time the use of notes had, however,
increased to the extent that in 1913, to meet the scarcity of currency,
State notes of 5 lire were also put into circulation.
With the establishment of a Bank of Italy branch in Eritrea a further
impulse was given to the circulation of notes, mainly after the outbreak
of World War I. After 1914 there was fairly steady growth of the total
bank notes. The supply of notes, however, was to some extent elastic.
That means that the supply of notes expanded and contracted following
seasons and the needs of business. At the end of 1921 the virtual
circulation of notes in Eritrea reached a total of almost 30 million lire, of
which 6 million in state notes and the rest in bank notes of various
denominations. These figures did not take account of notes exported

12
 directly and informally from the Colony (or better of the balance
between outflow and inflow of notes outside official channels) and of
notes been destroyed.
In subsequent years the diffusion of notes in the Colony increased
further, but this phenomenon must be attributed more to immigration
from Italy than to a radical change in the habits of natives. Indeed, while
the inhabitants of the urban centres proved increasingly disposed to
accept payments in this form of money, the rural population showed
resistance. This behaviour, however, was not irrational as it might
appear. It was not only a matter of confidence in the paper currency, in
its exchangeability and in its attitude to preserve the value over time
performing the function of an asset, but also a matter of physical
conservation. This paper made kind of token money, in fact, did not
prove ideal and safe for hoarding, given the primitive living conditions
of the Eritrean peasants.

6. The Founding of Eritrean banks.

The Bank of Italy, once settled in Eritrea, worked to promote the

creation of new financial institutions and the Asmara branch functioned as
a central bank for the colonial financial system as well, when these
colonial institutions came into being. It can also be said that one of these
institutions, the first to be constituted, was set up in Asmara with the
assistance of the Italian central bank itself. The announcement of the
founding of the Banca Cooperativa Popolare Eritrea (henceforth referred
as BCPE), published in the official gazette of the Colony on March 11th,
1915, stated, in fact, that it was an initiative under the patronage of the
Bank of Italy, approved by the colonial government. The “people’s bank”
model was opted for with the aim of furthering the co-operative movement
in Eritrea and of establishing, alongside the Bank of Italy, which operated
much as a commercial bank, a new bank in a certain way complementary
(Spagnoli 1938). BPCE was directed, therefore, to address the small
business segment of the market, which was almost neglected by the Bank
of Italy. The membership fees were to build up the equity capital of the
credit co-operative and profits were to be distributed in the form of
dividends to members according to the number of shares owned.
BPCE, set up by 312 members who had purchased 6,848 registered
shares of 50 lire each, started to do business on June 1st, 1915. The
number of shareholders was destined to increase rapidly because,

13
according to the statute of the bank, no single shareholder could own
more than 100 shares. At the end of 1915 the number of shareholders
had increased to 370 and the paid-up capital to 433,050 lire. The success
of the business and the high dividends distributed by BPCE brought in
other shareholders in the following years to the extent that, at December
31st, 1920, the shareholders numbered 485 and the paid-up capital was
881,650 lire (Mauri 1980).
BPCE’s earning assets consisted to large extent of loans, each of
modest amount, granted to a clientele consisting of small traders and
craftsmen who were not necessarily shareholders in the bank. The
technical form generally adopted was the discount of trade bills,
followed by the current account overdraft facilities, often backed up by
guarantees, the advances against goods (usually stored in the Bank’s
own godown), warehouse receipts and securities Adequate margins
against collateral were required. The collateral for secured loans could
also be represented by shares of the bank itself. BCPE was collecting
funds by means of current accounts, savings deposits and time deposits
on which were paid interests at rates considered attractive for savers and
integrated these financial resources by turning to the rediscount desk of
the Bank of Italy in Asmara branch office (Mondaini 1919).
BCPE’s business grew rapidly during its early years reflecting the
economic development of the Colony due chiefly to World War I. In
1916 2,247 bills of exchange were discounted for a total of 5,217,579
lire, but the discounted bills in the following year were 7,211. The
operative peak was reached in 1920 with a movement of accounts of 374
million lire and a profit of 681,848 lire.
Different in character from BCPE was the Banca per l’Africa
Orientale (henceforth referred as BAO), set up as a joint stock company
in Rome on September 7th, 1917 and having its head office in Massawa
and a branch office in Mogadishu in Somalia. Both offices were located
in port cities and this feature indicates clearly the type of activity to
which it intended to pursue. BAO was created on the initiative of the
Banca Italiana di Sconto, which in those very years, thanks to a rather
imprudent investment policy, had seen a rapid growth which placed it
among the major Italian banks. The Banca Italiana di Sconto wished to
expand, even indirectly, its business also in the colonies and chose this
initiative to achieve its objective.
The Banca Italiana di Sconto was not, however, the largest
shareholder in this new African banking venture since it was intended to
provide it with funds essentially by means of portfolio rediscount. BAO

14
registered capital was a million lire, subdivided into 2,000 shares of 500
lire each and Banca Italiana di Sconto had subscribed only 300 shares.
An equal shareholding was held by the Compagnia Mineraria Coloniale,
with head office in Tripoli. The major shareholders of BAO were two
Italian businessman, both of whom had inside the bank the position of
managing director, one resident in Massawa and the other in Mogadishu.
The responsibility of the former was limited to Eritrea, while the latter’s
regarded Somalia.
BAO opened its doors to the public in April, 1918, offering a wide
range of financial services permitted by its statute. As distinct from the
former co-operative bank, the new bank dealt mostly with important
customers and undertook the financing of international trade. BAO,
inspired by the universal banking model adopted in Italy by the Banca
Italiana di Sconto, was authorised to be involved in all forms of credit
business: short term commercial loans and overdrafts on current
accounts, medium and long term credit, trading in equities and holding
shares of companies working in different sectors of the economy such as
agriculture, industry, transport, mining (Mondaini 1919).
The multifarious activities of BAO leave no doubts that it was able
to adapt fully to the business conditions of the colonial economy so as to
exploit profitably all the opportunities available. As a consequence BAO
was able to make high profits when economic conditions were
favourable, but it showed its weakness at the moment when Eritrean
economy met the first difficulties on account of its exiguous equity
capital and of excessive exposure to risks because of the quality of
investments. The insufficiency of the equity capital was recognised by
the executive directors and accordingly, in October, 1919, the share
capital was doubled and finally, in 1921, elevated to 4 million lire.

7. The Banking Crisis

In the early twenties the Eritrean banking system consisted of an

autonomous branch of the Bank of Italy which combined operations
pertaining to commercial banks with the activity of central bank and of
two private banks. One belonged to the co-operative movement, had a
definitely local character and was assisted by the Bank of Italy, while
the other, with bias towards foreign trade business, was linked to a large
Italian bank. There were in the Colony a total of six bank branch offices

15
or sub offices located as follows: two in Asmara, two in Massawa, one
in Keren and one in Adi Keyi.
The favourable conditions for Eritrean economic development
resulting from the export boom during the war period were, however,
only transitory. The impetus of growth did not survive long. Foreign
trade declined and the fall in exports was accompanied by a fall in prices
of raw materials in international markets. The sharp reduction of
demand from abroad threw the economy of the Colony into a serious
crisis (Spagnoli 1938). All the principal market oriented productive
sectors were hit and all domestic prices, even of imported goods, fell. In
particular, there were falls in the prices of silver, and of both urban and
rural real estates.
The Bank of Italy branch, thanks to its prudent lending policy, to
the proceeds from administering the colonial treasury service and to help
from the head office in Rome, succeeded, without serious repercussions,
in overcoming the crisis years, although it was obliged to downsizing
and to cut costs by shrinking its operational network. The other two
banks present in Eritrea suffered much more heavily the depression and
dropped in a very difficult situation, for which they themselves, at least
in part, were responsible.
As the crisis started, BAO revealed its weakness to the full due to
the lack of liquidity and to the poor quality, in terms of credit risk, of its
earning assets. On the other hand the co-operative bank, which had
followed a more cautious lending policy, committed the imprudence of
being too generous in distributing dividends to its shareholders during
the prosperous years. The first to succumb was BAO, brought down also
by the very serious problems faced in Italy by the Banca Italiana di
Sconto, the Italian bank with which was linked. The extraordinary
general meeting of the BAO shareholders, held on January 2,1923,
deliberated the liquidation of the bank.
BCPE, for its part, succeeded in overcoming the initial difficulties
thanks to the Italian central bank’s support, but the situation continued
to worsen with the great slump until, in the beginning of 1931, it was on
the edge of collapse. The extraordinary shareholders meeting,
immediately convened, decided to depreciate the share capital by 75%
following a rectification of assets value in the balance sheet. A change
in the organizational and financial structure was, as well, opted for in
order to provide greater flexibility. As from October, 1932 the co-
operative bank took on the new name of Banca del Littorio and its
statute was changed, but the transformation did not succeed in putting it

16
on its feet. The newly named bank was short lived. The continuing
crisis of the Eritrean economy suggested putting an end to the life of this
bank and in March, 1933 was decided the liquidation.
No better fate met the Banca Coloniale di Credito (henceforth
referred as BCC), which was established in December, 1923 with a
capital of one million lire, divided into 2,000 shares of 500 lire each, on
the initiative of the Banca Nazionale di Credito, which had been created
in May of the same year in Italy as a successor to the Banca Italiana di
Sconto. The Banca Nazionale di Credito had subscribed 90% of the
share capital of BCC, while the remaining 200 shares were divided into
five equal parts and subscribed by the managing director, who was the
BAO liquidator, and by four local businessmen, of whom one was an
Eritrean. BCC started to operate the following year with the head office
in Asmara and a branch in Massawa, concentrating in particular to
operations connected with international trade. In 1925 the capital was
doubled to meet the increasing needs due to the growth of business.
However in 1930, following an exchange of shares, the bank Credito
Italiano got the control over BCC. The new principal shareholder,
judging the profitability to be insufficient and the presence in Africa to
be non-strategic, in 1932 decided to liquidate BCC.
As a result of the severe banking crisis, in mid-thirties the Eritrean
branch of the Bank of Italy was the only financial institution still
providing commercial banking services in the Colony of Eritrea.
However, in the fall of 1935, just before the outbreak of the war, the
financial scene was suddenly changing as two outstanding Italian
commercial banks decided to land into the Colony. The Banca
Nazionale del Lavoro moved first and decided to open branch offices in
Asmara, Massawa and Dekamere. Banco di Roma was second in the
scramble for East Africa and opened a branch office in Asmara (de
Rosa 1984). In the next years Banco di Roma established in Eritrea two
more branch offices (Assab and Massawa), followed by Banco di Napoli
with three branch offices (Asmara, Dekamere, Massawa). In 1940 the
Eritrean banking network consisted of five institutions: Bank of Italy,
Banco di Roma, Banca Nazionale del Lavoro, Banco di Napoli and
Cassa di Credito Agrario e Minerario. The first four financial
institutions were metropolitan whereas only the fifth was local. These
institutions operated a total network of 13 branch offices located in four
cities: Asmara, Massawa, Assab and Dekamere.

17
 8. Agricultural Credit

Agricultural credit is an especial topic that needs a separate

approach in a study devoted to analyse the financial system of Eritrea.
From the outset, the prospects for development in the Eritrean Colony
appeared to be mainly related to agriculture, but this sector was long
neglected by the credit system. On many occasions the Italian farmers of
the Colony had asked both colonial authorities and the government in
Rome, to provide medium and long-term loans, at a concessionary
interest rate, devoted to land improvement for agricultural use. The
indigenous farmers, in turn, although they had no claim, were in need of
small loans to escape from the exorbitant rates charged by local
moneylenders.
The banks present in the Colony were not, however, in a position to
meet these requests. The difficulties in supplying credit adequate both in
quantity and quality to the particular conditions of agriculture were to be
found not only in the absence of a specialised financial institution, but
also in more profound causes relating to land tenure system in the
Colony (Zecarias 1966, Admassie 2000). It was impracticable, in fact,
for financial institutions to carry out long-term lending to farmers
without receiving a mortgage guarantee as a collateral. In other words
the need was felt for a land reform in Eritrea that would provide
property titles and demarcate precisely the boundaries of agricultural
estates and would replace the indigenous tenure system, a regime based
on a diffused uncertain collective property, by a regime cantered on
registered individual property (Pollera 1913, Tappi 1926). This reform,
apart from the serious technical difficulties and the heavy costs
involved, also met obstacles of political nature since there was the not
unfounded fear of wounding the susceptibilities of the natives by
introducing innovations which would upset their long-established
traditions of land tenure (Colucci 1936).
It is not surprising, therefore, that as a direct result of the tangle
made up by technical difficulties, budget constraints and political fears,
both the government in Rome and the colonial authorities had for many
years refrained from taking initiatives in this field giving the impression
of remaining absent and insensitive in face of requests raised from

18
several quarters. It was necessary to wait until 1922 before the first law
on the matter of agricultural credit for Eritrea was passed. This law
provided for the granting of long-term loans to farmers who had already
undertaken, or would have undertaken within three years, the
reclamation of land for agricultural use. The loans, made directly by the
colonial government were repayable in 50 years and the amounts were
to be disbursed according to the state of progress of the improvement
works. The total amount of money available for lending over a three -
year period corresponded to 35 million lire. An interest rate of 2.5% was
applied and the State was taking for its account the difference between
this rate and the rate to be paid to the Cassa Depositi e Prestiti of Rome
from which the funds derived.
In view of the special procedure to be followed for granting loans,
which each time required for a single application an authorisation by the
Ministry of the Colonies, the category of farms which were eligible for
concessionary loans was limited and farms with a cultivable area of less
than 3,000 hectares were excluded. The supply of formal credit was
therefore denied to small and medium-size farms and, in fact, to all the
indigenous farmers. Furthermore, the supply of short-term loans was not
contemplated by the law. An attempt to remedy this last shortcoming
was made by a decree, dated April 1930, issued by the colonial
government of Asmara, which set up in its own offices a service for
granting agricultural loans, initially making available a revolving fund
of 400,000 lire.
This service was instituted with the aim of granting operation credit
(short term) to the farmers who were landowners, concessionaries or
tenants. The loans had the technical form of discount of agricultural
promissory notes, the term could not exceed 12 months and the amount
loaned could not be more than a third of the estimated value of the
expected produce. A discount rate of 2.5% was charged and this income
served only to cover the non-financial (administrative) costs. The
amount of the revolving fund, even after further allocations, remained,
however, quite insufficient to satisfy the needs. Loan recoveries were
also unable to maintain an adequate inflow of revolving funds. On the
other hand, the Colony’s budget did not permit more. It must be added
that the disastrous harvest of 1931, caused by an exceptional draught,
meant that a large number of farmers was not in a position to repay the
money borrowed and it became necessary to remit the debts. As a result
the revolving fund was rapidly exhausted (Mauri 1980).

19
 In these circumstances a project matured of setting up an
agricultural credit section within the Eritrean branch of the Bank of
Italy. It was felt that this project could represent the best solution in
order to channel an adequate flow of funds towards the agricultural
sector. The Bank of Italy, no longer restricted by its statute, accepted the
proposal at the condition that only operation credit should be granted.
The Section was, accordingly, constituted by a decree, dated November,
1932 issued by the Ministry of the Colonies (Tuccimei 1998). The
financing was to have been mainly indirect, reaching farmers through
associative bodies and in particular through the Consorzio Agricolo
Eritreo. The technical forms contemplated were those of discounting
agricultural bills and advances on produce, and in this way was given
more consideration to the security available with collateral than to the
repayment capacity of the farms. The loans were to serve for financing
the purchase of physical inputs and for the running of the farms, for
product processing and also for the payment of rents and concession
fees and for insurance premiums. The term could not exceed one year.
Exceptions were made for loans devoted to the purchase of livestock
and machinery, for which repayment could extend up to five years
(Mauri 1967).
It is worthwhile to note that, for the first time, the needs of the
indigenous farmers were taken into account. It was arranged, in fact, that
the Consorzio Agricolo Eritreo could grant credit in kind in the form of
supplies of seeds, fertilisers, livestock and tools. It was also permitted
for the illiterate borrowers to substitute fingerprints for signatures
provided the amount of each transaction did not exceed 5,000 lire and
that the signatures of two witnesses were added. These supplementary
signatures were not, however, a guarantee, but attested simply the
presence of witnesses at the moment of drawing up the contract.
Initially, the activity of the agricultural credit section of the Italian
central bank branch was only modest for understandable reasons of
caution at the take-off stage, but already in the second year there were
92 credit transactions. However, in the following years, both on account
of the continuing agricultural crisis and in the absence of radical
reforms, the amount of credit granted remained below expectations.
Moreover, there remained to be talked the area of land improvement
loans, for which Italian legislation contemplated special provisions. It
was recognised that the Bank of Italy was not a suitable institution to
offer such a form of rural credit, and accordingly, in December, 1932 the

20
Cassa di Credito Agrario (hencefore referred as CCA) was created from
the pre-existing autonomous Service of the colonial government.
The seed capital of CCA should have been paid up by the
government of the Colony using the limited inflow funds recovered
from repayment of the outstanding loans granted by the pre-existing
Service of agricultural credit, integrating them with funds coming from
other sources. Also contemplated were annual contributions by the
colonial government as refund of administrative expenses. CCA was
authorised to borrow money from financial intermediaries in the Colony
or in Italy. In relation to lending CCA was to grant land improvement
loans as well as seasonal and operation credit. The indigenous farmers
were penalised since the condition requiring to borrowers valid
individual ownership title deeds, land certificates or occupation rights
on the land which they cultivated proved to be very restrictive for them,
given the local customs on land tenure. Furthermore, even when
conditions of eligibility existed, the indigenous farmers were required to
get prior authorisation by the colonial government (Mauri 1967).
The land improvement loans could not exceed half the value of the
farming land at the end of improvement works in the case of borrowers
being landowners, while for the concession holders the ceiling was
represented by the estimated cost of improvement works already carried
out and of those of the works included in the project still to be initiated.
In all cases a first lien of mortgage was contemplated for these loans. Le
length of the loans varied according to their scope. Loans for crops
having a growth cycle of several years had a maximum duration of 15
years, while for the purchase of farming land up to 30 was possible.
Interest rates were to be fixed annually by the Governor of the Colony
on the advice of the Board of Directors of CCA.
The scarcity of funds and difficulties of organisational nature
delayed the start of operational activity until the beginning of 1935. In
that year CCA, with a paid up capital of one million lire, began lending
operations, but just after a few months had to suspend its activity
following the outbreak of hostilities with Ethiopia (Tuccimei 1998)..
Besides local initiatives, mention should be made of loans to
Eritrea’s agricultural sector by Italian banks not present with their own
branch offices in the Colony. In fact, in the autumn of 1930 the Societa’
Imprese Africane was created with the aim of developing a plantation
system for agriculture in the Italian holdings in the horn of Africa. This
was a Banca Commerciale Italiana enterprise in which other Italian
financial institutions also took part as shareholders. The capital of

21
 Società Imprese Africane was initially fixed at 3 million lire. This
company obtained in concession from the colonial government of
Eritrea 16,000 hectares of land on the Tessenei plain in the west, near
the Sudanese border, to be destined for the cultivation of cotton.

9. Summary and Conclusion

The paper offers an overview of the early stages of monetary and

banking development of Eritrea at the time when this country was under
Italian colonial rule. As pointed out by many development economists
monetization and financial development have a positive interaction with
economic growth (Drake 1980). Economic development must have
started in Eritrea after the rise of banking industry. Italy began the
colonisation of Eritrea in the period 1880-1890, but the foundations of
the monetary and banking system in the country occurred in the first two
decades of the 20th century, at the time when the Colony benefited of
the favourable economic conditions resulting from the export boom
during World War I. The Bank of Italy, in those years, played a leading
role in promoting the financial development process. This policy was
implemented by widening the monetary area and by supporting actively
the establishment of autonomous financial institutions. The design was
to transform, in due time, the Eritrean branch of the Italian central bank
into a new fully independent financial institution. The Italian invasion of
Ethiopia launched from Eritrea in 1935 and the following merger of the
two countries into the Italian East African Empire (A.O.I.) set up a
broad colonial banking network, extended to cover all Italian
possessions in the Horn of Africa and closely linked with the
metropolitan financial system. This event, however, marked the failure
of the attempts to create an autonomous financial system in Eritrea. The
development process for the establishment of an autonomous monetary
and banking system of the country took off again only in 1993, once the
independence had been finally achieved.

22
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25
 CONTENTS

Abstract………………………………………………….1

1. Introduction… ……………………………..2

2. The Colony of Eritrea……………………... 3

3. The Monetary Setting ……………………4

4. The Bank of Italy lands in Eritrea…………..7

5. The Circulation of Banknotes………………11

6. The Founding of Eritrean Banks……………12

7. The Banking Crisis …………………………14

8. Agricultural Credit…………………………17

9. Summary and Conclusion………………….21

BIBLIOGRAPHY …………………………...22.

26
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95.14 – G. BOGNETTI - R. FAZIOLI, Lo sviluppo di una regolazione europea nei grandi servizi pubblici a rete
96.01 – A. SPRANZI, Il ratto dal serraglio di W. A. Mozart. Una lettura non autorizzata
96.02 – G. BARBA NAVARETTI - I. SOLOAGA - W. TAKACS, Bargains Rejected? Developing Country Trade
Policy on Used Equipment
96.03 – D. CHECCHI - G. CORNEO, Social Custom and Strategic Effects in Trade Union Membership:
Italy 1951-1993
96.04 – V. CERASI, An Empirical Analysis of Banking Concentration
96.05 – M. FLORIO, Il disegno dei servizi pubblici locali dal socialismo municipale alla teoria degli incentivi
96.06 – G. PIZZUTTO, Piecewise Deterministic Markov Processes and Investment Theory under Uncertainty:
 Preliminary Notes
96.07 – I. VALSECCHI, Job Assignment and Promotion
96.08 – D. CHECCHI, L'efficacia del sistema scolastico in prospettiva storica
97.01 – I. VALSECCHI, Promotion and Hierarchy: A Review
97.02 – D. CHECCHI, Disuguaglianza e crescita. Materiali didattici
97.03 – M. SALVATI, Una rivoluzione copernicana: l'ingresso nell'Unione Economica e Monetaria
97.04 – V. CERASI - B. CHIZZOLINI - M. IVALDI, The Impact of Deregulation on Branching and Entry Costs in
the Banking Industry
97.05 – P.L. PORTA, Turning to Adam Smith
97.06 – M. FLORIO, On Cross-Country Comparability of Government Statistics:OECD National Accounts 1960-94
97.07 – F. DONZELLI, Pareto's Mechanical Dream
98.01 – V. CERASI - S. DALTUNG, Close-Relationships between Banks and Firms: Is it Good or Bad?
98.02 – M. FLORIO - R. LUCCHETTI - F. QUAGLIA, Grandi e piccole imprese nel Centro-Nord e nel Mezzogiorno:
un modello empirico dell'impatto occupazionale nel lungo periodo
98.03 – V. CERASI – B. CHIZZOLINI – M. IVALDI, Branching and Competitiveness across Regions in the Italian
Banking Industry
98.04 – M. FLORIO – A. GIUNTA, Planning Contracts in Southern Italy, 1986-1997: a Prelimary Evaluation
98.05 – M. FLORIO – I. VALSECCHI, Planning Agreements in the Mezzogiorno: a Principle Agent Analysis
98.06 – S. COLAUTTI, Indicatori di dotazione infrastrutturale: un confronto tra Milano e alcune città europee
98.07 – G. PIZZUTTO, La teoria fiscale dei prezzi in un’economia aperta
98.08 – M. FLORIO, Economic Theory, Russia and the fading “Washington Consensus”
99.01 – A. VERNIZZI – A. SABA, Alcuni effetti della riforma della legislazione fiscale italiana nei confronti delle
famiglie con reddito da lavoro dipendente
99.02 – C. MICHELINI, Equivalence Scales and Consumption Inequality: A Study of Household Consumption Patterns
in Italy
99.03 – S.M. IACUS, Efficient Estimation of Dynamical Systems
99.04 – G. BOGNETTI, Nuove forme di gestione dei servizi pubblici
99.05 – G.M. BERNAREGGI, Milano e la finanza pubblica negli anni 90: attualità e prospettive
99.06 – M. FLORIO, An International Comparison of the Financial and Economic Rate of Return of Development
99.07 – M. FLORIO, La valutazione delle politiche di sviluppo locale
99.08 – I. VALSECCHI, Organisational Design: Decision Rules, Operating Costs and Delay
99.09 – G. PIZZUTTO, Arbitraggio e mercati finanziari nel breve periodo. Un’introduzione

00.01 – D. LA TORRE – M. ROCCA, A.e. Convex Functions on Rn

00.02 – S. M. IACUS – YU A. KUTOYANTS, Semiparametric Hypotheses Testing for Dynamical Systems with Small
Noise
00.03 – S. FEDELI – M. SANTONI, Endogenous Institutions in Bureaucratic Compliance Games
00.04 – D. LA TORRE – M. ROCCA, Integral Representation of Functions: New Proofs of Classical Results
00.05 – D. LA TORRE – M. ROCCA, An Optimization Problem in IFS Theory with Distribution Functions
00.06 – M. SANTONI, Specific excise taxation in a unionised differentiated duopoly
00.07 – H. GRAVELLE – G. MASIERO, Quality incentives under a capitation regime: the role of patient expectations
00.08 – E. MARELLI – G. PORRO, Flexibility and innovation in regional labour markets: the case of Lombardy
00.09 – A. MAURI, La finanza informale nelle economie in via di sviluppo
00.10 – D. CHECCHI, Time series evidence on union densities in European countries
00.11 – D. CHECCHI, Does educational achievement help to explain income inequality?
00.12 – G. BOESSO – A. VERNIZZI, Carichi di famiglia nell’Imposta sui Redditi delle Persone Fisiche in Italia e in
Europa: alcune proposte per l’Italia
01.01 G. NICOLINI, A method to define strata boundaries
01.02 – S. M. IACUS, Statistical analysis of the inhomogeneous telegrapher’s process
01.03 – M. SANTONIi, Discriminatory procurement policy with cash limits can lower imports: an example
01.04 – D. LA TORRE, L’uso dell’ottimizzazione non lineare nella procedura di compressione di immagini con IFS
01.05 – G. MASIERO, Patient movements and practice attractiveness
01.06 – S. M. IACUS, Statistic analysis of stochastic resonance with ergodic diffusion noise
01.07 – B. ANTONIOLI – G. BOGNETTI, Modelli di offerta dei servizi pubblici locali in Europa
01.08 – M. FLORIO, The welfare impact of a privatisation: the British Telecom case-history
01.09 – G. P. CRESPI, The effect of economic policy in oligopoly. A variational inequality approach.
01.10 – G. BONO – D. CHECCHI, La disuguaglianza a Milano negli anni ’90
01.11 – D. LA TORRE, On the notion of entropy and optimization problems
01.12 – M. FLORIO – A. GIUNTA, L’esperienza dei contratti di programma: una valutazione a metà percorso
01.13 – M. FLORIO – S. COLAUTTI, A logistic growth law for government expenditures: an explanatory analysis
01.14 – L. ZANDERIGHI, Town Center Management: uno strumento innovativo per la valorizzazione del centro
storico e del commercio urbano
01.15 – A. MAFFIOLETTI – M. SANTONI, Do trade union leaders violate subjective expected utility?
Some insights from experimental data
01.16 – D. LA TORRE, An inverse problem for stochastic growth models with iterated function systems
01.17 – D. LA TORRE – M. ROCCA, Some remarks on second-order generalized derivatives for C1,1 functions
01.18 – A. BUCCI, Human capital and technology in growth
01.19 – R. BRAU – M. FLORIO, Privatisation as price reforms: an analysis of consumers’ welfare change in the UK
01.20 – A. SPRANZI, Impresa e consumerismo: la comunicazione consumeristica
01.21 – G. BERTOLA – D. CHECCHI, Sorting and private education in Italy
01.22 – G. BOESSO, Analisi della performance ed external reporting: bilanci e dati aziendali on-line in Italia
01.23 – G. BOGNETTI, Il processo di privatizzazione nell’attuale contesto internazionale
02.01 – D. CHECCHI – J. VISSER, Pattern persistence in european trade union density
02.02 – G. P. CRESPI – D. LA TORRE – M. ROCCA, Second order optimality conditions for
differentiable functions
02.03 – S. M. IACUS – D. LA TORRE, Approximating distribution functions by iterated function systems
02.04 – A. BUCCI – D. CHECCHI, Crescita e disuguaglianza nei redditi a livello mondiale
02.05 – A. BUCCI, Potere di mercato ed innovazione tecnologica nei recenti modelli di crescita endogena con
concorrenza imperfetta
02.06 – A. BUCCI, When Romer meets Lucas: on human capital, imperfect competition and growth
02.07 – S. M. IACUS – D. LA TORRE, On fractal distribution function estimation and applications
02.08 – P. GIRARDELLO – O. NICOLIS – G. TONDINI, Comparing conditional variance models: theory and
empirical evidence
02.09 – L. CAMPIGLIO, Issues in the measurement of price indices: a new measure of inflation
02.10 – D. LA TORRE – M. ROCCA, A characterization of Ck,1 functions
02.11 – D. LA TORRE – M. ROCCA, Approximating continuous functions by iterated function systems and
optimization problems
02.12 – D. LA TORRE – M. ROCCA, A survey on C1,1 functions: theory, numerical methods and applications
02.13 – D. LA TORRE – M. ROCCA, C1,1 functions and optimality conditions
02.14 – D. CHECCHI, Formazione e percorsi lavorativi dei laureati dell’Università degli Studi di Milano
02.15 – D. CHECCHI – V. DARDANONI, Mobility comparisons: Does using different measures matter?
02.16 – D. CHECCHI – C. LUCIFORA, Unions and Labour Market Institutions in Europe
02.17 – G. BOESSO, Forms of voluntary disclosure: reccomendations and business practices in Europe and U.S.
02.18 – A. MAURI – C.G. BAICU, Storia della banca in Romania – Parte Prima -
02.19 – D. LA TORRE – C. VERCELLIS, C1,1approximations of generalized support vector machines
02.20 – D. LA TORRE, On generalized derivatives for C1,1 vector functions and optimality conditions
02.21 – D. LA TORRE, Necessary optimality conditions for nonsmooth optimization problems
02.22 – D. LA TORRE, Solving cardinality constrained portfolio optimization problems by C 1,1 approximations
02.23 – M. FLORIO – K. MANZONI, The abnormal returns of UK privatisations: from underpricing to outperformance
02.24 – M. FLORIO, A state without ownership: the welfare impact of British privatisations 1979-1997
02.25 – S.M.IACUS – D. LA TORRE, Nonparametric estimation of distribution and density functions in presence of
missing data: an IFS approach
02.26 – S.M. IACUS – G. PORRO, Il lavoro interinale in Italia: uno sguardo all’offerta
02.27 –G.P.CRESPI – D. LA TORRE, M. ROCCA, Second-order optimality conditions for nonsmooth multiobjective
02.28– D. CHECCHI –T. JAPPELLI, School Choice and Quality
03.01– D. CHECCHI, The Italian educational system family background and social stratification
03.02 – G. NICOLINI, – D. MARASIN, I Campionamento per popolazioni rare ed elusive: la matrice dei profili
03.03 – S. COMI, Intergenerational mobility in Europe: evidence from ECHP
03.04 – A. MAURI, Origins and early development of banking in Ethiopia
03.05 – A. ALBERICI, Strategie bancarie e tecnologia
03.06 – D. LA TORRE – M. ROCCA, On C^(1,1) constrained optimization problems
03.07 – M. BRATTI – A. BUCCI, Effetti di complementarietà, accumulazione di capitale umano e crescita economica:
teoria e risultati empirici
03.08 – R. MacCULLOCH – S. PEZZINI, The role of freedom, growth and religion in the taste for revolution
03.09 – L. PILOTTI –N. RIGHETTO, A.GANZAROLI Web strategy and intelligent software agents in decision process
for networks knowledge based
03.10 – G. P. CRESPI –D. LA TORRE – M. ROCCA, Mollified derivatives and second-order optimality conditions
03.11 – A. BUCCI, R&D, imperfect competition and growth with human capital accumulation
03.12 – G. NICOLINI – A. LO PRESTI, Combined estimators for complex sampling
03.13 – M. FLORIO – S. VIGNETTI, Cost-benefit analysis of infrastructure projects in an enlarged European Union:
an incentive-oriented approach
03.14 – M. FLORIO, Electricity prices as signals for the evaluation of reforms: an empirical analysis of four European
countries
03.15 – A. FILIPPIN, Discrimination and workers’ expectations
03.16 – A. FILIPPIN, Discrimination and workers’ expectations: experimental evidence
03.17 – D. VANDONE, Il mercato italiano dei fondi di investimento socialmente responsabili
03.18– M. FINI, Uno sguardo sul concetto di differenziale dalle origini ai giorni nostri: tra storia e teoria
03.19 – M. SANTONI – F. ZUCCHINI, Legislative output and the costitutional court in Italy
03.20 – A. MARINI, Programmazione multi-obiettivo: teoria e applicazioni
03.21 – M. FLORIO – M. GRASSENI, The missing shock: the macroeconomic impact of British privatisation
03.22 – A. ALBERICI, La banca cooperativa da banca della comunità locale a bene utile alle comunità servite
03.23 – G. NICOLINI – F. DE BATTISTI, A formative model for measuring customer satisfaction with a degree course
03.24 – G. NICOLINI – A. LO PRESTI, Estimation methods for mixed populations
03.25 – M. SPANO’, Stock market expectations, effects on prices and aggregate income
03.26 – M. SPANO’, Productivity shocks and hedging: theory and evidence
03.27 – F. DE BATTISTI – G. NICOLINI – S. SALINI, The rasch model to measure service quality
03.28 – A. MAURI, Eritrea’s early stages in monetary and banking development