Grandma and Handelsbanken

On the day I was born, November 1st, 1965, my dear late grandma Emmy walked down to the Handelsbanken office on Baggeby Torg on Lidingö, where she opened a savings account in the name of her latest grandson and deposited 25 Swedish kronor.

Thanks to that simple act, I have been a client of Handelsbanken every single day of my life. Not that grandma knew one bank from the other – Handelsbanken was simply the closest one to her apartment – but it feels as if she managed to pick a winner.

To this day, Handelsbanken is the only Swedish bank not to have needed to raise new capital in the current crisis. And if I’m not mistaken, they were the only bank not to do so in the financial meltdown of the early Nineties, too. (Please correct me if you know.) In fact, Handelsbanken just announced a four-percent increase in operating profit for 2008.

Meanwhile, in Incompetentland, Nordea is raising 25.8 billion kronor (I want to spell it out to get a good feel for the insane amounts), SEB is raising 15 billion kronor and Swedbank 12.4 billion kronor.

All I know that separates Handelsbanken from its fumbling competitors is that they don’t work with budgets, but I’m not schooled enough to judge if that’s a sufficient reason. Maybe they just really put grandma’s 25 kronor to good use.