1910 - 1925

Filling in the Map: Growth by Amalgamation

Quebec Bank

Quebec Bank emblem, 1878

Founded in 1818 and chartered by the Province of Lower Canada in 1822, the Quebec Bank was Canada's second oldest chartered bank. The bank's original business was insular as it served the lucrative timber trade along the Ottawa and St. Lawrence Rivers. By the late nineteenth century, timber profits had declined and the Quebec Bank's directors belatedly turned to a strategy of national expansion. Branches were opened in Canada's major cities but other banks were already well established and winning new business was difficult. Without a broad, diversified national portfolio of accounts, the fate of the Quebec Bank was sealed by the declining profitability of its business in Quebec.

Hit hard by bad loans and the impact of the pre-First World War slump on Quebec's commerce, the Quebec Bank's directors approached Royal Bank with a merger offer. The 1917 acquisition of the Quebec Bank brought to Royal Bank a valuable pool of desperately needed trained staff and fortified the bank's presence in Quebec.

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