Majority-owned by a local tycoon who was subsequently charged with embezzlement, Corpbank saw more than a fifth of deposits drain away in a week-long bank run in June, prompting the central bank to seize control and shut it down.

As the crisis unravelled, panic spread to another lender and put the spotlight on the quality of banking supervision in one of Europe's poorest countries, which has struggled to revive economic growth and stem a sharp fall in foreign investment.

Unable to get at their money for months, depositors had staged regular protests on the streets of the capital Sofia and other cities. After an audit pointed to a huge capital shortfall and major failings in the way Corpbank was run, the central bank took away its licence, a decision that forced Bulgaria's new government to raise more debt to help pay out deposits.

This time around, there was no panic in front of the branches of nine banks chosen to pay out more than 3.6 billion Bulgarian lev ($2.3 billion) in guaranteed deposits to more than 255,000 depositors -- just anger and frustration.

That anger could benefit foreign-owned lenders such as Unicredit Bulbank, Raiffeisen Bank and Societe Generale, which are under EU rather than purely local supervision.