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Someone on my Facebook feed posted a video that stated that the Rothschild family owns all the central banks in the world except in North Korea, Iran, and Cuba. It also claims that in the year 2000 there were four more countries on that list: Afghanistan, Iraq, Sudan, and Libya.

Humans Are Free lists the central banks from many countries and claims that they are "Rothschild Owned & Controlled". Realities Watch has a similar list.

FourWinds10 claims:

Only 3 countries left w/o ROTHSCHILD Central Bank!

The Rothschild family is slowly but surely having their Central banks established in every country of this world, giving them incredible amount of wealth and power.

Does the Rothschild family own most of the world's central banks?

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    Welcome to Skeptics. tupto! This is a rather confusing claim because it would seem at first blush that most central banks are not owned by any family. So, we need to make sure we are getting the claim right. Please provide some references to the video where this claim is being made.
    – Oddthinking ♦
    Commented Nov 10, 2016 at 15:55
  • @Oddthinking Notability: fourwinds10.net/siterun_data/government/… and more broadly realcurrencies.wordpress.com/2013/07/15/… ; realitieswatch.com/… ; connectsavannah.com/savannah/…
    – DavePhD
    Commented Nov 10, 2016 at 16:00
  • @DavePhD: Thanks. I included several, but not Real Currencies because I couldn't work out the claim there, nor the Cecil Adams article, which seems closer to an answer than a claim (but lacks any evidence).
    – Oddthinking ♦
    Commented Nov 10, 2016 at 18:51
  • Please limit the comments to stuff that actually can improve the questions.
    – Sklivvz
    Commented Nov 12, 2016 at 13:34
  • The interesting this is that if the claim were true, it would seem only to indicate that you're far better off living in a country with a central bank owned by the Rothschilds (Rothschildren?) than not.
    – Grimm The Opiner
    Commented Sep 20, 2017 at 14:55

2 Answers 2

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This statement is obvious and complete nonsense.

Central banks don't have private owners as a rule, with the only notable exception being the US Federal Reserve bank, which is owned jointly by a number of major US private banks. For example:

The European central banks are similarly government institutions, and they share ownership of the European Central Bank.

It is a relatively simple matter to find the legislative acts that created each institution, which give precise terms of ownership and governance of each.

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    I, for one, find it interesting that you cite the very organizations about whom such claims are made as a reliable source for stating that they are false. ;)
    – Wildcard
    Commented Nov 12, 2016 at 10:14
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    @Wildcard For Germany, here is a source from the Federal Ministry of Finance. It says that the Deutsche Bundesbank is not privately owned. None of the board members of the bank are Rothschilds.
    – tim
    Commented Nov 12, 2016 at 12:35
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    @Wildcard It's more sources than any of the claims for Rothschild ownership.
    – DJClayworth
    Commented Nov 12, 2016 at 14:17
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    @Wildcard You got it the other way around; if the question is "Do rothschild own all central banks", then the source suffice. If the question is "Do rothschild secretely own all central banks", then it is on the person making the claim to provide sufficient proof that this is the case. One cannot take absence of proof as "proof" to support the thesis that it is a secret.
    – Ant
    Commented Nov 12, 2016 at 14:55
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    The Swiss National Bank is another exception (I would call it notable, but YMMV); the shares are even listed at the stock exchange. But yes, most central banks don’t have any private owners.
    – chirlu
    Commented Nov 12, 2016 at 20:10
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This answer is limited to the USA.

As held by the 8th circuit in Kennedy C. Scott v. Federal Reserve Bank of Kansas City, et al.:

The Bank also does not constitute an federal agency based on any “proprietary interest” the United States possesses. The Bank is considered a separate corporation owned solely by commercial banks within its district, distinct from the Board of Governors. See 12 U.S.C. §§ 282, 287, and 341. The United States does not own stock in the Bank. Id.; see also Lewis v. United States, 680 F.2d 1239, 1241 (9th Cir. 1982) (explaining the structure of Federal Reserve Banks).

According to the Federal Reserve itself:

Under the Federal Reserve Act, each of the twelve Reserve Banks is separately incorporated with its own board of directors. In each Reserve District, commercial banks that are members of the Federal Reserve System own the stock of their District's Reserve Bank and elect the majority of the Reserve Bank's board of directors; the remainder of the directors are appointed by the Federal Reserve Board.

According to the Federal Reserve Bank of Richmond (one of the twelve Federal Reserve Banks):

More than one-third of U.S. commercial banks are members of the Federal Reserve System. National banks must be members; state chartered banks may join by meeting certain requirements. ... Each state member bank must hold capital stock in the Richmond Fed

So the 12 Federal Reserve Banks of the United States are owned by a large list of banks, not any one particular family.

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    Many of those banks are at least partially owned by organizations that at least partially own others, and may partially own each other. Tracing ownership and control is non-trivial. I imagine the FEC continually has people working on questions something like this.
    – user36688
    Commented Nov 10, 2016 at 22:29
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    I know this is a vague question, but how much autonomy do the Fed Reserve owners have? Are their actions largely prescribed by legislation, or do they get to make significant decisions (e.g. consistent with anti-semitic conspiracy theories?)
    – Oddthinking ♦
    Commented Nov 10, 2016 at 23:46
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    @Oddthinking The 12 federal reserve banks each have 9 directors (not including branch directors). 6 of the 9 are elected by the shareholder companies, the other 3 by the Board of Governors (US government). The 3 represent the public, plus 3 of the 6 represent the public; only 3 of the 9 represent the owner companies. richmondfed.org/about_us/who_we_are/board_of_directors
    – DavePhD
    Commented Nov 11, 2016 at 12:52

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