Bank Hapoalim: The Largest Israeli Bank

Bank Hapoalim (TASE: POLI; Frankfurt: HPBA) is the largest Israeli commercial bank by total assets — approximately NIS 700 billion in FY2024 with net profit of approximately NIS 8 billion. Founded in 1921 in Tel Aviv by the Histadrut labor federation, it is one of the oldest continuously operating financial institutions in Israel and the reference banking institution for Israeli industrial finance, corporate credit, and retail banking at national scale. Formerly controlled by the Arison family across 1996–2019, Hapoalim now trades as a dispersed-shareholder public bank following Shari Arison's 2018–2019 sale of the controlling stake to a Brookfield-Israel-led consortium — one of the most consequential changes in the modern Israeli banking-control landscape.

Company Snapshot

Legal entity: Bank Hapoalim B.M.
Founded: 1921, by the Histadrut labor federation
Ticker: TASE: POLI; Frankfurt: HPBA
Headquarters: Tel Aviv, Israel
FY2024 total assets: approximately NIS 700 billion
FY2024 net profit: approximately NIS 8 billion
Employees: approximately 8,500
Branch network: approximately 200 branches across Israel
Retail customers: approximately 2.5 million Israeli households
Historical control: Arison family, 1996–2019
Current control: Dispersed public float following the 2018–2019 Arison sale
CEO: Yadin Antebi (since 2024, succeeding Dov Kotler)
Chairman: Reuven Krupik

The 1921 Histadrut Founding

Bank Hapoalim was founded in 1921 in Tel Aviv as the banking arm of the Histadrut — the General Federation of Labor, the umbrella labor organization that anchored the pre-state Zionist workers' movement and became one of the most consequential Israeli civil-society institutions of the twentieth century. The bank's name — "Hapoalim" (הפועלים) — means "The Workers" and reflects the founding orientation toward labor-movement and cooperative finance.

For the first three decades, Bank Hapoalim operated primarily as a financing institution for Histadrut-affiliated enterprises — the Solel Boneh construction cooperative, Koor Industries, the kibbutz-and-moshav agricultural sector, and the broader Israeli labor-movement industrial base. The 1948 declaration of the State of Israel expanded the bank's role into general commercial banking; by the 1960s Bank Hapoalim had become one of the two anchor banks of the Israeli banking system alongside Bank Leumi.

The Arison Era, 1996–2019

The Israeli banking sector was privatized progressively through the 1980s and 1990s, following the 1983 Israeli banking-shares crisis that had left the major banks under state ownership after the crisis-era bailouts. Bank Hapoalim was privatized in 1996. Ted Arison — the Israeli-American businessman who founded Carnival Cruise Lines — acquired the controlling stake through the privatization process. It was one of the largest private banking acquisitions in modern Israeli history.

Ted Arison died in 1999. Control transferred to his daughter Shari Arison through the Arison Group holding structure. The Arison family stewardship of Bank Hapoalim ran for 23 years across two generations — one of the longest-tenured controlling-shareholder positions at the top of the modern Israeli banking system. The tenure spanned multiple Israeli banking-sector cycles, regulatory regimes, political environments, and the 2007–2009 global financial crisis (through which Bank Hapoalim navigated without the extreme distress that affected European and American banks of comparable scale).

The 2019 Brookfield-Led Exit

In 2018–2019, Shari Arison sold the Arison Group's controlling position in Bank Hapoalim to a consortium led by Brookfield Asset Management and Israeli institutional partners. The transaction ended 23 years of Arison family control and restructured Bank Hapoalim's ownership into a dispersed public float — an unusual arrangement for a major Israeli commercial bank, and one that has since shaped the bank's board independence, credit-allocation posture, and regulatory engagement.

The exit ran through several factors. The Israeli banking-sector regulatory environment tightened materially through the 2010s, with stricter capital requirements and higher scrutiny of concentrated bank ownership. The Bank of Israel's push toward dispersed ownership at the largest banks reflected the broader post-2008 global banking regulatory posture. And the Arison Group's strategic monetization at a favorable point in the Israeli banking cycle preserved capital for the family's continued industrial-portfolio holdings (Shikun & Binui, Salt of the Earth, adjacent positions).

Commercial Position and Product Suite

Bank Hapoalim operates the largest retail-banking franchise in Israel by customer count and one of the two anchor corporate-banking positions (alongside Bank Leumi). The product architecture spans:

Retail banking — approximately 2.5 million Israeli household customers across current accounts, credit cards, mortgages, and consumer lending
Corporate and commercial banking — the largest Israeli corporate credit book, running relationships with the major Israeli industrial groups, the defense companies, and the leading technology firms
Capital markets and investment banking — Poalim Capital Markets, one of the largest Israeli capital-markets operations
Private banking and wealth management — high-net-worth Israeli client base plus the international private-banking franchise
Isracard — credit-card business, historically a Bank Hapoalim subsidiary spun off in 2019 as a separately listed entity (TASE: ISCD)

The bank's international operations run through units in the United States (Bank Hapoalim USA), the United Kingdom, Switzerland (Bank Hapoalim Switzerland), and adjacent private-banking centers.

Financial Trajectory

Bank Hapoalim's financials through the mid-2020s reflect the broader Israeli banking sector's earnings expansion during the 2022–2024 interest-rate cycle:

FY2024 total assets: approximately NIS 700 billion
FY2024 net profit: approximately NIS 8 billion
FY2024 ROE: approximately 15 percent
Tier 1 capital ratio: approximately 12.5 percent — well above regulatory minimums
NPL ratio: approximately 1.2 percent — one of the lowest among developed-market major banks

The 2022–2024 Bank of Israel rate-hike cycle — from near zero through approximately 4.75 percent — materially expanded net interest margins across the Israeli banking sector. Bank Hapoalim's earnings expanded roughly in line with the sector, with the corporate-credit book and mortgage-adjacent lending providing the deposit-and-loan spread that drove the profit-cycle expansion.

The Nadav Prosecutorial Cycle

Bank Hapoalim was one of the Israeli banks involved in the multi-year US Department of Justice investigation into offshore-banking tax evasion by US citizens through Israeli-bank private-banking channels. Bank Hapoalim entered a deferred prosecution agreement with the DOJ in 2020 and paid $874 million in penalties across the Swiss and US authorities. The settlement resolved the multi-year investigation and reset the bank's US regulatory posture.

Category Position — The Israeli Banking Duopoly

Bank Hapoalim and Bank Leumi function as the anchor duopoly of the Israeli banking system. The two banks:

Are of roughly comparable scale (each approximately NIS 700 billion in total assets)
Serve roughly comparable retail-customer bases
Compete directly across corporate credit, capital markets, and wealth management
Face the same regulatory framework under the Bank of Israel's Banking Supervision Department
Sit as the two largest TASE-listed banks by market capitalization

The remaining three banks in the five-bank concentrated Israeli banking system — Israel Discount Bank, Mizrahi Tefahot, and First International Bank of Israel (FIBI) — operate at smaller scale but hold specialty positions (Mizrahi's mortgage franchise, FIBI's Bino-family control, Discount's Sephardic-heritage and US private-banking footprint).

Why Bank Hapoalim Matters

Bank Hapoalim is the anchor Israeli commercial-banking institution and one of the reference cases in Israeli institutional capital. Its 100-plus-year continuity — from Histadrut founding to modern dispersed-shareholder public bank — bridges the pre-state Zionist labor economy, the mid-century Israeli industrial buildout, the 1990s privatization era, and the current dispersed-ownership institutional-banking layer. The bank's balance sheet is one of the largest single financial positions in the Israeli economy, and its credit-allocation decisions shape the operating capital available to the Israeli industrial, defense, and technology sectors.

The strategic significance beyond a single-institution frame is the pattern of Israeli banking-sector concentration and stability. Five banks intermediate nearly the entire Israeli economy, and Hapoalim is the largest and most historically anchored of the five.

What to Watch in 2026 and Beyond

Yadin Antebi's tenure as CEO and the strategic posture through the current interest-rate cycle
The continuing dispersed-shareholder governance structure and any strategic-shareholder developments
Digital-banking competitive dynamics against One Zero (the Amnon Shashua-founded digital bank) and adjacent entrants
Corporate credit book performance amid the ongoing Israeli technology sector reset (see the shekel-driven layoff cycle)
Bank Hapoalim's role in the Israeli capital-markets ecosystem, particularly around any Wiz-scale technology company listings

Frequently Asked Questions

Who founded Bank Hapoalim?
The Histadrut labor federation founded Bank Hapoalim in 1921 in Tel Aviv as the banking arm of the pre-state Zionist workers' movement. "Hapoalim" (הפועלים) means "The Workers."

Did the Arison family own Bank Hapoalim?
Yes. Ted Arison acquired the controlling stake through the 1996 privatization. Shari Arison inherited the position in 1999. The Arison family controlled Bank Hapoalim for 23 years until Shari Arison sold to a Brookfield-Israel-led consortium in 2018–2019.

Is Bank Hapoalim the largest Israeli bank?
Yes, by total assets — approximately NIS 700 billion in FY2024. Bank Leumi is a close second at comparable scale. The two function as an anchor duopoly at the top of the concentrated Israeli banking system.

What is Bank Hapoalim's ticker?
TASE: POLI for the primary Israeli listing. Frankfurt: HPBA for the secondary German listing. Bank Hapoalim is a constituent of the TA-35 index and TA-Banks index.

Who runs Bank Hapoalim?
Yadin Antebi has served as CEO since 2024, succeeding Dov Kotler. Reuven Krupik serves as Chairman. The board reflects the dispersed-shareholder structure following the 2019 Arison exit.

How profitable is Bank Hapoalim?
FY2024 net profit was approximately NIS 8 billion at approximately 15 percent return on equity — driven by the net-interest-margin expansion through the 2022–2024 Bank of Israel rate-hike cycle. Non-performing loan ratio at approximately 1.2 percent is among the lowest of developed-market major banks.

Sources

Bank Hapoalim annual reports and TASE filings under POLI. Bank of Israel supervisory disclosures. Historical coverage of the 1996 privatization, the Arison-era stewardship, and the 2018–2019 Brookfield-led exit transaction.