The Bank of Cape Verde is Cape Verde's central bank. It is located in the national capital of Praia on Santiago in Cape Verde. The government established it in 1975 as a bank combining commercial banking and central banking functions by nationalizing the operations of the Portuguese colonial and overseas bank, Banco Nacional Ultramarino, which had established its first branch in Cape Verde in 1865. In 1993, the government split-off the commercial banking functions into the newly established Banco Comercial do Atlantico, which it then privatized after 1998.