Qatar National Bank (QNB Group) ( ar, بنك قطر الوطني) is a
Qatari multinational
commercial bank
A commercial bank is a financial institution which accepts deposits from the public and gives loans for the purposes of consumption and investment to make profit.
It can also refer to a bank, or a division of a large bank, which deals with co ...
headquartered in
Doha
Doha ( ar, الدوحة, ad-Dawḥa or ''ad-Dōḥa'') is the capital city and main financial hub of Qatar. Located on the Persian Gulf coast in the east of the country, north of Al Wakrah and south of Al Khor, it is home to most of the c ...
, Qatar. It was founded in 1964 and currently has subsidiaries and associates in 31 countries spanning three continents. The bank's ownership is evenly divided between the Qatar Investment Authority and members of the public.
History
QNB was founded on 6 June 1964 as the country's first domestically-owned
commercial bank
A commercial bank is a financial institution which accepts deposits from the public and gives loans for the purposes of consumption and investment to make profit.
It can also refer to a bank, or a division of a large bank, which deals with co ...
. It had 35 employees in its first year and was initially headquartered in a government-owned building in Qatar's capital city,
Doha
Doha ( ar, الدوحة, ad-Dawḥa or ''ad-Dōḥa'') is the capital city and main financial hub of Qatar. Located on the Persian Gulf coast in the east of the country, north of Al Wakrah and south of Al Khor, it is home to most of the c ...
.
The two currencies in circulation at the time were the
Indian rupee
The Indian rupee (symbol: ₹; code: INR) is the official currency in the republic of India. The rupee is subdivided into 100 '' paise'' (singular: ''paisa''), though as of 2022, coins of denomination of 1 rupee are the lowest value in use wher ...
and
British pound
Sterling (abbreviation: stg; Other spelling styles, such as STG and Stg, are also seen. ISO code: GBP) is the currency of the United Kingdom and nine of its associated territories. The pound ( sign: £) is the main unit of sterling, and th ...
. As Qatar's population continued increasing through the century, QNB started establishing branches in other parts of the country.
In 1974, the first branches outside of Doha were opened in
Al Khor and
Mesaieed. The bank installed its first
ATMs in 1988 in its Doha branches, and, in the next year, introduced VISA cards for its clients.
By 2015, it had established 76 branches in Qatar.
Qatar National Bank (QNB) controls an 82.59 percent stake in Bank QNB Indonesia.
For the nine months ended September 30, 2020, net profit was QR 9.5 billion (US$ 2.6 billion). Total assets also increased by 8% since September 30, 2019, to reach QR986 billion (US$271 billion).
Data leak
A leak of data from the bank was made public in April 2016. The leaked files were published on
Cryptome.
The files contained the personal data of the bank's clients, as well as credit card information and passwords. The leak was divided into folders for individual groups of clients; these included Qatar's
Al Thani family, state security officials, staff of
Al Jazeera Media Network
Al Jazeera Media Network (AJMN) (Arabic: الجزيرة, romanized: al-jazīrah, IPA: �l (d)ʒæˈziːrɐ , referring to the Qatar Peninsula) is a Qatari international state-owned public media conglomerate headquartered at Qatar Radio and T ...
, the news organisation endowed by the Qatari state, former Qatari national intelligence agency
Mukhabarat,
UK's
The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland, commonly known as the United Kingdom (UK) or Britain, is a country in Europe, off the north-western coast of the continental mainland. It comprises England, Scotland, Wales and North ...
currently active foreign intelligence counterpart
MI6 and their nondescript French and Polish counterparts.
See also
*
List of largest banks
References
{{reflist
Banks of Qatar
Banks established in 1964
1964 establishments in Qatar
Qatari brands
Companies based in Doha
Multinational companies headquartered in Qatar
Companies listed on the Qatar Stock Exchange