Abstract

The main trends of economic development on the Crimean peninsula had been shaped to the end of the 19th century. Due to the climatic and geographic peculiarities of this area of the empire, these principal economic sectors of investments were agriculture and health resort treatment and rest. This article examines the operational activities of several branches of the State Bank in the Tavricheskaya guberniya in the late 19th and early 20th centuries. It particularly deals with the work of the most active branches of the bank in Sevastopol and Feodosia. The author dwells less upon the activities of the Yalta branch, which were started on a permanent basis only on the eve of the First World War. The decision to open a branch in Simferopol in 1915 turned out to be unpromising when the State Bank’s policy to reduce credit operations became obvious. In a short period of its working time, this branch only managed to replenish its staff and to master mainly the methods of processing passive operations. Taking into account the nature of the activities of the branches of the State Bank, the author describes in more detail bill of exchange accounting and commodity loan procedures. The article examines the methods of credit operations of the main Russian credit institution in the Tavricheskaya guberniya, its successes and failures in allocating its funds to the business circles of the province. In particular, it pays attention to the cooperation of the Sevastopol branch with small credit institutions to provide grain loans to peasants. The small credit institutions helped this branch increase the amount of grain loans to peasants up to 1 mln rubles and more by 1912. The author also reviews the activities of accounting and credit committees of the branches and their methods of work. He analyzes bill portfolios of the Sevastopol and Feodosia branches of the Bank and sources of their origin.