[ Volume XXVII
THE CHICAGO BANKER
22
Waterloo, Iowa
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THE NAUMAN CO.
Же Girard National Bank
Of Philadelphia
Capital,	$ 2,000,000.00
Surplus and Profits, .	. 4,100,000.00
Deposits,	40,450,000.00
FRANCIS B. REEVES,	President
RICHARD L. AUSTIN	JOSEPH WAYNE, Jr.
Vice-President	Cashier
THEO. E. WIEDERSHEIM	CHARLES M. ASHTON
Second Vice-President	Asst. Cashier
To Satisfactorily Handle Your Business, You Need a Philadelphia Account
Kansas City
St. Louis
fine condition, when the apparent shortage of crops is taken into consideration.
The statement shows the various kinds of deposits to be $36,867,749 which is an increase of $2,413,007 over the last statement issued June 23d.
Of this increase $1,8x5,989 is of individual deposits subject to check. It also shows the total reserve of 47 3-10 per cent in demand deposits, in cash and with other banks, and 12 2-10 per cent of the demand deposits in actual cash in the banks.
Guaranty Law Invalid
The Nebraska bank guaranty law, indorsed by W. J. Bryan and enacted by the last legislature, is invalid, the federal court decided last week. Judges Vendeventer and T. C. Munger at Lincoln handed down a decision affirming the decision of the lower court and making permanent the temporary injunction granted by the district court preventing the law from going into operation. Bank’s Bonds will be Sold
An order authorizing Bank Commissioner A. M. Young to sell bonds and warrants of the defunct Columbia Bank and Trust Company to the amount of about $200,000 and apply the proceeds to paying depositors’ claims on that institution was issued by Judge G. W. Clark. Commissioner Young declared that the defunct bank had not sufficient funds to pay its depositors and that he asked for the order because he did not want to draw too heavily on the state guaranty funds. New Bank Move
Now that every state bank in Texas has taken one or the other of the two plans of securing depositors under the new banking law, the department of insurance and banking is preparing to send out blanks to these banks upon which they must make official application for either one of the two plans by January 1st, 1910. In this application the bank must submit a statement of its resources and liabilities and also furnish other data and information for the guidance of the state banking board. Four hundred and ninety-seven banks in all have come under the law, 456 of which have taken the guaranty fund plan and 41 the bonding system.
there were liquid assets in the bank they should have been converted into cash and no extra assessment made. If the bank is reorganized, as now seems probable, and the guaranty fund is left in it as a deposit, the state will have nearly a million dollars deposited in this one bank, and no statement of the real condition of the bank will ever be made public. The bank commissioner and the governor have refused any information concerning the bank’s condition or to whom the loans were made.
The best legal authorities hold that the law is weak in not giving the state absolute power to enforce collection of the extra assessments, but the banks generally have paid up rather than make a test of the matter. The whole matter has caused much hard feeling and the state financial circles are disturbed by the affair in a way that it will take months to get back to the normal condition. The guaranty law may have stopped runs on the other banks, but the real trouble is that there is extant a sentiment that too much politics has been mixed with the operation of the bank commissioner’s office. The chief strength of the law is in its being administered without favoritism and the abolition of politics from the conduct of the guaranty fund. If the bank is reorganized, the test will be incomplete and will leave the state bankers wondering what is to be the real outcome of the law’s operation when several failures come dose together.
Texas Banks in Fine Condition
A condensed statement showing the financial condition of 435 state banks and 49 trust companies, at the close of business September 1st, was made by the Texas state department of insurance and banking which shows a surprisingly
Attention, Capitalists!
on nnn acres in one tract in the liveliest section of California.
Rich, deep soil; level as a floor. Grows 60 bushels of wheat, 14 tons of sugar beets to the acre. Natural gas and artesian water underlie tract. Can all be put under irrigation for $2.00 per acre. Price $30.00 per acre, $10.00 per acre down. Crops and rentals will meet balance of payments. Must be taken as a whole. Can be subdivided and retailed at from $75.00 to $100.00 per acre, the same as lands adjoining. Quick action required. Address
Dept. E, Golden Gate Land Co., 327 Chronicle Bldg., San Francisco, Cal.
The entire Southwest has talked of little else during the past two weeks than the failure of the Columbia Bank & Trust Co. of Oklahoma City, the largest state bank in Oklahoma, whose suspension has caused consternation among the advocates of the guaranty deposit law. Governor Haskell has gone to the rescue and has practically taken charge of the affair and the courts are filled with litigation growing out of it. Some of the suits have been in federal court, others have been withdrawn and the matter is being ironed out through much tribulation. The case is of such a character as to make it of wide interest. The bank was examined by two employees of the bank commissioner’s office on September 1st and pronounced perfectly safe. In less than four weeks it failed with a shrinkage of nearly $500,000 in resources. The deposits were almost three million dollars, of which half of a million approximately were Oklahoma funds, including $50,000 of the state guaranty fund itself.
The loss made it necessary for the bank commissioner to levy an additional special assessment on the state banks of three-fourths of one per cent of their deposits to make good the losses to the depositors. This means an average of nearly four per cent on the capital stock of all the state banks. It takes $20,000 out of Enid, $6,000 out of Ponca and so on through the state. It means three or. four months’ profits for many of the banks and the bankers are protesting against the levy. Most state bankers, especially friends of the guaranty idea, do not So much object to paying the money, though they will be without protection until the fund is reimbursed by the sale of assets of the failed bank, but they want to know what is being done with the money. If it is being deposited in the failed bank to make deposits with which to re-open they feel that it ought to be known, but no information will be given out.
The guaranty fund when the bank failed was $300,000; since then there has been a regular assessment of one-fifth per cent, bringing in $65,-000 and an emergerncy assessment bringing in $248,000. It is presumed that all the money was needed or the emergency assessment would not have been levied. State bankers declare that if