An Italian bank accepts giant wheels of cheese as collateral
Deep inside a climate-controlled vault in northern Italy, 500,000 golden wheels of cheese serve as a high-stakes reserve, backing hundreds of millions of euros in agricultural loans.
While most bankers worry about fluctuating interest rates, the staff at Credem Bank in the Emilia-Romagna region keep a closer eye on humidity and salt levels. Since 1953, this institution has accepted wheels of Parmigiano Reggiano as collateral for low-interest loans, treating the dairy product with the same reverence other banks reserve for gold bars. The bank currently stores roughly 325 million euros worth of cheese in its fortified warehouses, where each 40-kilogram wheel is meticulously aged for up to three years.
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