Extraordinary General Meeting: Division of the Yugoslav issue of the Bank for International Settlements' capital

An Extraordinary General Meeting (EGM) of the Bank for International Settlements (BIS) today decided to cancel the shares of the original Yugoslav issue of the Bank's capital. The BIS will issue an equivalent number of new shares which will be divided between the central banks of the five successor states to the former Socialist Federal Republic of Yugoslavia. These are the Central Bank of Bosnia and Herzegovina, the Croatian National Bank, the National Bank of the Republic of Macedonia, the Bank of Slovenia and the National Bank of Yugoslavia. The EGM, held in Basel, Switzerland, also decided to cancel the shares which had been provisionally issued in 1997 to four of the successor states' central banks.

The issuance of BIS shares to the central bank of Yugoslavia dates back to 1931. Following the break-up of former Yugoslavia in 1992, the Yugoslav participation in the BIS's share capital, in the name of the central bank of the former Socialist Federal Republic of Yugoslavia, had remained frozen pending a comprehensive settlement of all outstanding questions as to the legal status of the shares concerned. In April and May 2001, the five successor states and their respective central banks reached agreement on the division of the shares of the original Yugoslav issue between the five successor central banks.