Against the background of the end of the Napoleonic era and the reorganization of political conditions in Europe by the Congress of Vienna, the "Hamburger Sparkasse von 1827" was founded by Hamburg citizens on the initiative of Senator
Amandus Augustus Abendroth. In the spirit of Hanseatic merchants, this was done without a contribution from the city. Surprisingly, it was soon found that not only the financially disadvantaged population was investing their money, but also business people, craftsmen and other tradespeople appeared. This showed that the population had independently modified the original concept of a "poor savings bank". In the first few years, a business policy was pursued under the slogan “Sparkasse for the smallest amounts”, the primary goal of which was limited to deposits of 8 to 30 Kurant-Marks (at that time the common Hamburg currency), which earned interest at %. The business was initially modest, with two paid employees (bookkeeper and messenger) and six volunteers who were responsible for the deposits and withdrawals. The spatial presence was initially limited to two furnished offices: one each in the town hall and one in the Eimbeck house. From 1847 to 1848, the Hamburg architects Hermann Peter Fersenfeldt and Carl Friedrich Reichardt, built today's Sparkasse building, which was initially used as the Reichsbank headquarters, at Adolphsplatz 2 in Hamburg, directly across from the Hamburg Stock Exchange. A special turning point for the then young Sparkasse occurred in 1864. Due to differences in the management board of Haspa in connection with the abolition of the maximum deposit limit - now amounting to 60 marks - the two retired members of the board, Rudolf Martin and F. E. Schlueter, founded the "Neue Sparcasse von 1864" together with Senator Eduard Johns. This division lasted into the second half of the 20th century. It was not until 1968 that the first steps in the merger of the two savings banks, which took place in 1972, were finally taken, with the decisive efforts of the board spokesman Peter Mählmann. In contrast to the majority of savings banks in Germany under public law, the new “Hamburger Sparkasse” continued to be constituted as a “legal person under old Hamburg law”, as a private savings bank. An important step in the development of Haspa in the 1980s came with the end of the so-called savings bank war between Haspa and the state of Schleswig-Holstein. This particularly concerned a conflict in which the Hamburger Sparkasse was prohibited from opening further branches in the communities in Schleswig-Holstein bordering Hamburg. This legal dispute went up to the Federal Administrative Court on a legal level. This highest authority gave Haspa the right: It is allowed to open branches in the Hamburg area. On that day, the banking operations of Hamburger Sparkasse were transferred to a stock corporation and the company under old Hamburg law was renamed "Haspa Finanzholding". ==See also==