The first cooperatives were set up in Germany in the middle of the nineteenth century. The cooperative system’s pioneers include Hermann Schulze-Delitzsch and Friedrich Wilhelm Raiffeisen.

In 1872, another promoter of the cooperative system, Wilhelm Haas, set up a consumer cooperative society for farmers in Friedberg in the state of Hesse. The goal was to secure price advantages for members purchasing agricultural inputs.

The Deutschlandkasse lost not only its headquarters, which were located in East Berlin, but also virtually all its banking assets, which consisted almost exclusively of practically worthless bonds issued by the Third Reich.

In 1967 the Federal Supervisory Authority abolished the interest rate peg that had existed since the nineteen thirties. Competition with the saving banks and other banks increased, prompting central institutions and local cooperative banks to form larger units.

The structure as a cooperative financial services network with a two-tier structure in Northern, Eastern and Southern Germany and a three-tier structure in Western and South-western Germany remained unchanged for a decade.