TTc CHICAGO BANKER
A Weekly Paper Devoted to the Banking and Financial Interests of the Middle West
10 CENTS A COPY
Entered as Second-Class Matter January 15, 1903, at the Post Office at Chicago, Illinois, under Act of March 3, 1879
OCTOBER 23, 1909
New American Bank in China
Peking, October 19.—The International Banking Corporation opened a branch bank at Hankow to-day.
The corporation is an American concern, and was the first American house to enter the banking field in Peking, where it opened an office last June. Its purpose is to develop the trade of America in the far east.
The Hankow branch is the eighteenth that has been opened, others being located at Hong Kong, Canton, and Shanghai, China, and in Japan, British India, the Philippines, and South America. Its home office is in New York City.
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Utah National Bank Organized
Salt Lake.—The National Copper Bank has been organized here, at a meeting held in W. W. Armstrong’s office in the Dooly block. The bank will have a capital of $500,000, and will begin business with a surplus of $50,000. The stock in the bank, it is understood, has all been subscribed. It will open for business about January 1st next. Following the stockholders’ meeting the directors met and selected these officers: President, W. W. Armstrong; vice-presidents, John Dern and W. V. Rice; executive committee, W. W. Armstrong, John Dern, W. V. Rice, L. Hanchett and J. B. Risque.
Exchange National Bank
Though not quite three years old the Exchange National is one of the largest banks in Long Beach, California, having a capital of $100,000, and deposits almost $230,000. This institution is one of the progressive kind, believes in extensive advertising, also in encouraging savings accounts both large and small.
A. J. Wallace, president; M. V. McQuigg, vice-president ; William H. Wallace, cashier, and F. R. McQuigg, the assistant cashier, are all men of wide banking experience interested in the growth of the Exchange National Bank and Long Beach.
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Farmers and Merchants Bank
John Shearer has been elected president, T. C. Bull, vice-president; Bruce Keating, secretary and treasurer, and G. G. McCrory, cashier of the new Farmers & Merchants Bank of McCrory, Ark. The capital of the institution is $30,000.
Director in Two Banks
Charles B. Lamb has been elected a director of the Merchants National, and the Eaton County Savings Bank, of Charlotte, Mich., to succeed the late Edwin N. Ely, of Olivet.
Bank Note Over 500 Years Old
In the possession of a New York bank is an antique but well-preserved and very interesting banking relic. It is an engrossed document in Chinese, and, as the translation shows, is a certificate for 250 taels, redeemable in silver lyce, issued in 1367 by the board of finance under King Wu,
Of all the national banks in the country Michigan has only one-seventieth, there being 7,012 such banks in all. And of the capital invested in running them Michigan employs only one-one-hundred and ninety-second part.
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United States National
Aberdeen, Wash.—The United States National has begun business under its charter, taking over the business of the Union Bank and Trust Co. The new bank has a capital stock of $100,000, fully paid in. The officers are: Frank G. Jones, president; W. B. Mack, vice-president; W. F. Pauli, cashier. The Chehalis County Bank, of which F. G. Jones is also president, will continue at the Wishkah street banking house after the United States National moves.
WILLIAM H. WALLACE
Cashier Exchange National Bank, Long Beach, California
Mr. Treat may Go to Bank at Binghamton
It is understood that Charles H. Treat, United States treasurer, who will soon retire from office, will probably become cashier of a new national bank now being organized in Binghamton, N. Y.
Mr. Treat has had several offers, but that from Binghamton seemed most attractive and he has indicated his probable acceptance.
Banker’s Bail Fixed at $60,000
Madison, Wis., October 20.—Philip Allen Jr., vice-president of the First National Bank, Mineral Point, which failed recently, appeared before United States Court Commissioner C. E. Blake here to-day, charged with embezzlement of $168,000 of the bank’s funds. Commissioner Blake decided to fix the bail at $60,000.
A new bank building is to be erected by the Utica (N. Y.) Trust & Deposit Co.
The directors of the Merchants National, Portland, Ore., have voted the increase of the capital stock from $500,000 to $1,000,000.
For a Central Bank
Boston, Mass., October 18.—Making probably his last public appearance before his retirement from the office of treasurer of the United States on November 1st, Charles H. Treat, of Washington, to-night addressed the Bank Officers Association in Ford Hall upon a “National Clearing House Bank and the Currency Problem.” The meeting was presided over by former Secretary of the Navy John D. Long. Treasurer Treat said, among other things:
“The lessons of the recent panic have emphasized the importance of having more co-operation among the banks of the country. This desire has taken shape more particularly in the advocacy, by important financial interests, of the establishment of a great central or clearing house bank, that would provide resources whereby the banks could have adequate facilities for rediscounting their loans, and thereby be afforded such banking accommodations as business requires.
“While I am an advocate of a central bank or national clearing house bank, the great benefit of which will be opportunity for rediscounting loans that it offers to other banks, I am still convinced that the people would not accept any currency that does not have the government guaranty .behind it.
“The extraordinary suggestion has been put out that in order to prevent further depreciation of the two per cent bonds experimental legislation authorizing the establishment of postal savings banks should be enacted, so that the money savings of the people might absorb the output of some $730,000,000 of two pu־ cent bonds, and thereby safeguard the government’s credit.
“Matters would seem to have reached a deplorable state if the government credit has to take such form of relief.
“I am not so vigorously opposed to a restricted experiment with postal savings banks in such states as have not the facilities for savings banks, but I do not deem it wise to embark on a large scale in cumbering the administrative government with individual affairs which, it seems to me, cannot be so well developed and conserved by public administration as by individual direction and responsibility.”
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Michigan Has Few National Banks
Washington.׳—A curious fact to the treasury officials is that so large and prosperous a state as Michigan pays so little attention to, and takes so little interest in, national banks. The total capital invested in national banks in Michigan is only $4,-999,000, which is scarcely half of Oklahoma’s showing, and only a third of that of Missouri, while California, Illinois and Ohio each have practically four times as much in this business as Michigan.
Michigan has only 10 of the smallest size national banks, those having a capital of $25,000, whereas Iowa has 102, North Dakota 113, Illinois 146, Minnesota 169, and Oklahoma 255. Michigan has only 100 national banks of all sizes, and in this respect is far outranked by every other state in the union of anything like the same population. Michigan has had, in her time, a total of 206 national banks, but of these 15 became insolvent and 91 went into liquidation. Only seven states have sent more of these banks into liquidation than Michigan.