The relations between the Greek state and the National Bank in mid-1920s underwent many tensions as to the prospects of the banking system. As Kostas Vergopoulos observes, "The oppositionbetween the state and the National Bank of Greece was an expression of the serious structural changes that were being generated during the interwar period. In essence, during that time the State was being emancipated from the custody of the National Bank and took away successively certain functions that the latter exercised cumulatively until then: a) in 1927 the branch of mortgage credit was taken away and was transferred to the National Mortgage Bank established by the state, b) in 1928 the currency issue and supply and the branch of discounts were taken away and transferred to the Bank of Greece, c) in 1929 the agricultural credit was taken away and transferred to the Agricultural Bank of Greece (Agrotiki Trapeza tis Ellados)." A pressing issue was the agricultural credit, that is the branch dealing with agricultural loans. Equally forceful was the discussion about the covers in gold that allowed the issue of banknotes. Since the foundation of a state issuing bank had been decided, they would have to be transferred from the possession of the National Bank to the responsibility of the Bank of Greece.

On February 23, 1928 a contract was signed between the state and the National Bank of Greece concerning the foundation and function of the Agrarian Bank (Georgiki Trapeza). That would be an autonomous not-for-profit organisation, but without being submitted to the Parliament for legislative ratification, on the rationale that the funds transferred to the Bank were not adequate for its function. In relation to the covers of the National Bank, things were even more complicated. Apart from the initial cost of the particular quantities in gold, which the National Bank agreed to return to the state, it withheld the surplus value that had been created during the period that the bank administered the covers. On the other hand, politicians such as Alexandros Papanastasiou had emphatically maintained that the covers of banknotes as well as their surplus value, that had increased inordinately due to the currency stabilisation policy, should be handed over to the state and appropriated for the reinforcement of the Agrarian Bank's funds (speech at the Parliament, 24/4/1928). However, the government and the minister of Finance, G. Kafantaris, acknowledged the claim of the National Bank and the right of keeping the surplus value of the covers by way of compensation, since the bank had been deprived of the issue privilege (law 3483/1928). The partial advocacy of Eleutherios Venizelos to Papanastasiou's position brought about the fall of the Zaimis government. Venizelos had maintained, by a letter addressed to Kafantaris, that the surplus value of the covers in pounds -a surplus value due exclusively to the law on the drachma stabilisation- should be transferred to the state. Therefore, according to Venizelos, 560,000,000 drachmae were owed to the National Bank in place of 1,200,000,000 drachmae that it got. The Venizelos government that was formed after the elections of August 19, 1928 forced the National Bank to accept the new arrangement about the covers that was settled by the contract of June 3, 1929. This contract also included the obligations of the National Bank towards the Agrarian Bank. Lastly, on June 27, 1929 a contract was signed between the state and the National Bank concerning the "foundation and function of the Agricultural Bank".