Shikoku Bank’s leadership has come up with a bizarre way of reassuring clients of its commitment – promising to pay with their lives if found guilty of ‘financial irregularities’.

Banking executives are always held to high ethical standards, considering that they handle the wealth of thousands, sometimes millions of people, but while they face serious punishment in case of fraud or embezzlement, they aren’t quite expected to pay with their lives. That is not the case with the management of Shikoku Bank, a financial institution whose top 23 executives, including President Miura, signed a blood oath requiring them to commit seppuku if found guilty of engaging in financial irregularities, embezzlement or other fraudulent activities. Rooted in the code of honor of Japan’s samurai era, the bizarre pledge posted on Shikoku Bank’s website went viral sparking reactions varying from admiration to disbelief.

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With just $3 million in assets, two employees, no ATM, no website, and no transaction fees, Kentland Federal Savings and Loan is the smallest bank in America, and it’s been around for over 100 years.

You’ve most likely heard of America’s banking giants – JPMorgan Chase, Morgan Stanley, Citigroup, Wells Fargo, and the Bank of America – but what about the smallest fish in the pond, so to speak? Well, at the opposite end, we have Kentland Federal Savings and Loan, officially the smallest bank in the United States of America. Founded back in 1920, by the great-grandfather of its current CEO, this tiny financial institution has only ever had one branch in Kentland, Indiana, and has only offered three services – obtaining a home mortgage, opening a savings account, and opening a certificate of deposit.

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A Russian man was recently arrested after allegedly being tricked into throwing a Molotov Cocktail in a Moscow bank by scammers who also relieved him of his life savings.

A few days ago, Moscow police arrested a 48-year-old man from Ruza, a town in the Moscow region of Russia, for allegedly throwing a Molotov cocktail in a Sberbank branch in the Russian capital. Bank employees were able to put out the flames before the firefighters arrived on the scene and police quickly identified and detained the perpetrator. But this was far from an open-shut case; the more the suspect tried to explain, the crazier his story got, and by the end, investigators didn’t know whether to throw the book at the guy or just feel sorry for him…

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A Russian man is taking a bank to court for forcing him to pay interest on a loan he never asked for, after fraudsters used his stolen smartphone to take out the pre-approved loan in his name.

Vladimir Volokhovich, from Moscow, has been making news headlines in his home country of Russia after finding himself right in the middle of an unusual scandal. Volokhovich is being asked by the Russian branch of Alpha Bank to pay up a pre-approved loan taken up by fraudsters in his name, using his stolen mobile phone. Not only did the scammers manage to transfer part of the funds to their accounts, but the interest on the loan Vladimir never asked for is adding up every day. The bank, however, refuses to cancel the loan, claiming that Vladimir should have reported his smartphone as stolen sooner.

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Gilberto Baschiera, the former manager of a bank in Forni di Sopra, a small town in Italy’s Dolomite Alps, has been nicknamed the “Robin Hood Banker” for taking around €1 million ($1.15 million) from rich savers’ accounts, over several years, to help poor people qualify for loans.

It all started in 2009, at the the height of the global financial crisis, when banks’ criteria for credit approval assessments changed. It was no longer about an overall assessment of the customer, but about the reliability of the client, which was established at the bank desk, on a computer. So when a local man came to Gilberto Baschiera’s office asking for a small loan, and the bank manager saw that he didn’t qualify according to the new criteria, he felt sorry for him. Instead of turning him away like most bank managers would have done, Baschiera took some money out of the account of a wealthy client, and added it to the poor man’s account, so that he would qualify. But this was only the beginning of Gilberto Baschiera’s career as a modern-day Robin Hood of the banking world.

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Cash-for-cheese sounds more like a joke that a serious financial agreement, but in some regions of Italy it’s a reality. The famous Parmesan is so precious that some banks are willing to keep the cheese as collateral against loans to local producers.

The Credito Emiliano bank has hundreds of branches and thousands of employees around central and northern Italy. Its central offices look like those of any other banking institution, with cameras watching every angle, security doors to lock down the place and even a big vault in the back. Only you’re not going to find too many diamonds or hard cash stored in there. Instead, there are hundreds of thousands of Parmigiano-Reggiano cheese wheels, neatly placed on giant shelves. The bank takes the Parmesan from local producers in exchange for a cheap loan, and charges a 3% interest as well as a fee for looking after the cheese and making sure it matures properly in the air-conditioned, humidified vault. It might seem strange, but Credito Emiliano treats Parmigiano-Reggiano like other banks do gold. And for good reason, as the mountains of cheese locked away in its secured vault are worth around $200 million.

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They say the banking system is very complicated, but try telling that to a bunch of Indian street kids who set up a model bank with tens of branches all over South-East Asia.

In order to save money for a brighter future, a group of Indian children have created their own bank, where they can deposit their money and take advances whenever they need to. A branch of this unusual financial institution is located in a shelter for homeless runaway teens in New Delhi. It’s here that street children who work come to place their money for safekeeping, and take out development or welfare advances to start a business or invest in things they need for school. The most impressive thing about this bank for kids and teens is that it was initiated, implemented and is operated by children. In fact, Satish Kumar, who was elected bank manager for the New Delhi branch of the children’s development ‘khazana’ (Indian for ‘treasure chest’) doesn’t look a day over 12.

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