At five in the evening on September 16, Czech prime minister Vaclav Klaus gave a radio interview in which he poured scorn on the idea that a major Czech bank was on the brink of collapse.
A few hours later he sped to an urgently convened meeting with senior officials of the Czech National Bank (CNB) at the Strakova Akadamie government building in Prague. The meeting trailed on through the night, one of the longest in the short history of the republic. Under discussion was the perilous condition of Agrobanka, the fifth-largest Czech bank, and the largest wholly private one.
Agrobanka faced serious liquidity problems brought on by a run on deposits and a refusal by the four largest Czech banks to grant it interbank loans since mid-summer. As dawn broke, it was becoming clear that Agrobanka needed a massive bail-out or enforced administration by the CNB. Most of those present eventually agreed with central bank governor Josef Tosovsky that administration would be the most sensible course. Agrobanka thus became the subject of the twelfth and easily most significant government intervention in Czech banking since 1992.
Agrobanka's difficulties are still being investigated.