TAMÁS KOVÁCS – LEVENTE KOVÁCS 152 BANKING LEADERS WHO MADE THE HUNGARIAN GENERAL CREDIT BANK GREAT Tamás Kovács- Levente Kovács Abstract he Hungarian General Credit Bank (Magyar Általános Hitelbank: MÁH) was one, if not THE leading bank of the last third of the 19th century and the first half of the 20th century. We have numerous archival sources at our disposal regard- ing the bank, its operations, its leaders, the background to their decisions, and the bank’s employees. In our present study, which we begin by briefly presenting the history of the bank, we sketch the careers of its one-time leaders of outstanding significance. We show the important role their decisions played, and the impact they had on life in Hungary and on the Hungarian economy. Our goal is also to show that MÁH leaders were “only flesh and blood” with their own special at- tributes, fallibilities, and personal and family tragedies, who nevertheless always remained conscious of the responsibility towards their homeland that the tasks and the assets at their disposal represented. JEL codes: N23, N24, B31 Keywords: Hungarian General Credit Bank, banking history, bankers he ministerial cabinet in the Ministry of National Economy