Israeli cybersecurity tycoon Nir Zuk announced this morning that he plans to buy California’s Liberty Bank. As part of the move, Zuk plans to make the medium-sized bank based entirely on AI tools. Zuk’s latest business move comes after he agreed along with the other founders last month to sell Israeli digital bank Esh to credit card company Isracard, controlled by Yitzak Tshuva.

Zuk has filed a request to buy a large portion of the bank's shares, and if his offer is approved, he will become the bank's biggest shareholder.

The deal was made concurrently and in coordination with a deal to purchase some of the bank's shares by the founders of Bancorp, Betsy and Daniel Cohen. Details of the deal were not made public.

Zuk intends to appoint senior Esh Bank executives as directors of Liberty Bank's holding company - including Yuval Aloni, one of the founders of Esh Bank, and Dr. Nadine Bodo-Trachtenberg, former deputy governor of the Bank of Israel, who currently serves as Esh's vice chair.

The move was revealed a day after what appeared to be a wave of layoffs at Esh Bank's global technology company, eOS., which develops an AI-based digital banking system for banks around the world. Yesterday, all of the company's employees in Israel were summoned to the office, and informed of the dismissal of 30-40 employees who will be invited to a hearing.

Zuk’s takeover of Liberty Bank could constitute the founding of Esh's first infrastructure as a banking player in the US, after it established such activity in Israel. Esh operates on a model of establishing local branches, while at the same time selling its technology to banking and institutional entities.

Liberty Bank of California has $440 million in assets and branches in Southern California and the San Francisco Bay Area. It should not be confused with Liberty Bank of the Eastern US, which is far larger and has $8 billion in assets.

Published by Globes, Israel business news - en.globes.co.il - on April 13, 2026.

© Copyright of Globes Publisher Itonut (1983) Ltd., 2026.