International bank instituted by an agreement signed by Bulgaria, Hungary, East Germany, Mongolia, Poland, Romania, Czechoslovakia, and the Soviet Union in 1963 to facilitate economic cooperation among member countries and promote their development.
Cuba and Vietnam joined later. Its functions included making multilateral settlements in transferable rubles, advancing credit to members with temporary trade imbalances, accepting deposits in transferable rubles and in gold and convertible currencies, and conducting arbitrage and other financial operations. After the fall of the Soviet Union it became a Russian bank with a new charter.