Prior to the establishment of Intra Bank the partners had established International Traders (whose cable address was Intra) as a money changing business, and a general trading company with agencies such as Ford Motor Company, Facit business machines and others. International Traders had become the leading money exchange house of Beirut and most of the successful and wealthy expatriates, Najib Salha (wealthiest man in Lebanon in the 1950s and 1960s who later became a major shareholder in Intra Bank) included, were International Traders forex clients.