This book covers the history of the Bank for International Settlements (BIS) from 19301973.Covers the history of the Bank for International Settlements (BIS), from its founding in Basel in 1930 to the end of the Bretton Woods system in 1973, with a focus on cooperation among the main central banks for the stability and efficiency of the international monetary system.Covers the history of the Bank for International Settlements (BIS), from its founding in Basel in 1930 to the end of the Bretton Woods system in 1973, with a focus on cooperation among the main central banks for the stability and efficiency of the international monetary system.This book covers the history of the Bank for International Settlements (BIS), the first-born among the international economic institutions, from its founding in Basel in 1930 to the end of the Bretton Woods system in 1973. The first chapters explore the foundation of the BIS, its role in the financial crisis of 1931, the London economic conference of 1933, and in following years when central bank cooperation was mostly reduced to technical matters. Considerable attention is devoted to the much criticized activity of the BIS during World War II. The book then deals with the intensive central bank cooperation from the recreation of Europe's multilateral payments in the 1950s and for the support of the Bretton Woods system in the 1960s. The last chapter is devoted to the involvement of central banks in the first timid steps towards European monetary unification and to the eurodollar market.List of figures and tables; Foreword; Preface; List of acronyms; 1. International payments and central bank cooperation; 2. Gestation and birth; 3. Organisation and first operations; 4. The 1931 crisis and international lending; 5. The end of reparations, the gold standard and the 1933 London conference; 6. An autarkic and divided world; 7. Wartime; 8. Bretton Woods; 9. Reconstructing multilateral payments; 10. Achieving convertibility; 11. The 196ls*