The banking sector was one of the first economic sectors in which computer-based automated information processing systems were created in the USSR in the early 1960s. By 1960 the sphere of activity of the USSR Gosbank had already been prepared for the introduction of such automated systems since it was preceded by the experience of processing banking information on the counting-perforating machines of the mechanized accounting factories and machine-accounting stations of the Central Administration of the USSR. All this led not only to a large number of documents and paper consumption but also to a loss of efficiency. By the early 1960s, the USSR State Bank realized the need to solve logic and mathematical problems related to the analysis of economic activities of industries, enterprises serviced by the State Bank, and control of commodity turnover. The institutions of the State Bank of the USSR were no longer able to cope with such tasks without a computer-based system. Commercial loan servicing software was quite an important aspect that needed to be addressed.
Background of Commercial Loan Servicing Software
The history of the creation and application of banking information processing systems in our country can be divided into three major stages of 15 years each.
The first stage (1960-1975) was the creation of an experimental system “Bank” for automated accounting data processing in banking operations, automated control and debiting of interbranch turnover of State Bank institutions, automated maintenance of analytical and synthetic accounting of Vneshtorgbank operations.
The second stage (1972-1989) was marked by the creation of a unified hierarchic automated banking system of the USSR State Bank, which covered all levels of the State Bank’s institutions throughout the country
The third stage (from 1989 to the present day) is related to the creation of a new generation of automated systems designed for comprehensive automation of banking institutions that are forming in the conditions of the transition period in the economy of the country – the Central Bank and commercial banks.
- automation of interbank settlements carried out by the network of cash settlement centers and the Federal Settlement Center of the central bank;
- control of export-import foreign exchange transactions and measures to support the exchange rate of the currency;
- control of money circulation and money emission measures;
- control of the state of the financial and credit sphere in the countries ;
- functions of the lender of last resort in the interbank credit market.
Commercial banks and other financial and credit institutions are equipped with automated banking systems created on their orders by specialized firms – system integrators. These firms offer a range of different application systems for small, medium, and large commercial banks, system solutions, and services.
Commercial banks use the SWIFT international system of financial telecommunication to provide interbank settlements with foreign banks.
The software and hardware environment in which the applied program complexes of commercial banks operate consists of distributed data processing systems with the client-server architecture. In such an environment, automated workstations of bank employees are used, as a rule, based on personal computers and servers, as a rule, based on fail-safe clusters, and multiprocessor computers of the fourth generation, which are united in local networks.
