Cooperative Banks in Poland on Financial and Economic Crisis Conditions

The aim of the paper is to examine the conduct and performances of the cooperative banks on the financial and economic crisis conditions. The analyses show that the cooperative banks meet successfully the challenges they have faced due to the crisis. Despite the crisis, cooperative banks have increased their lending and deposits activity; however growth rate of these activities shows a falling tendency. It is worth noting that the indicators of different aspects of banking activity in the case of cooperative banks were better than in commercial banks in the period of July 2008-September 2009. In the first period of crisis, cooperative banks strengthened their position in banking sector; however, in 2009,their position weakened as estimated by the share in loans market and deposit market.