Credit institution set up as a cooperative society, created and experimented in Germany by Franz Hermann Schulze-Delitzsch (the Volksbank) and introduced in Italy by thinkers of that time as Luigi Luzzatti.

The first popular/cooperative bank in Italy was in Lodi, promoted by the Society of mutual aid in 1864, the second one in Milan. The cooperative banks rapidly and successfully spread, responding to the needs of the small local enterprises, traders and providing an accessible way to the credit.