Aus:
The Money Market Review, 6. Juli 1867. S. 6/7.
Schließen

Barned’s Banking Co. (Lim.)

Infamous swindling. The private Bank of Israel Barned et Co, oldestablished, wellknown private bank, since 1809. 1865 Prospectus for formation of Limited Liability Co. with 2 Mill. £. Capital, 40,000 shares, 50£ p. share, for the purchase of this business and to organise it on a broader basis. 160,000£ purchase money, payable by instalments in 2 years, guarantee by the Barneds of the assets taken over, „a moderate payment for a lucrative business“. Dieß alles im Prospect. The assets taken over were utterly rotten, the guarantee utterly worthless. At that moment the firm Barned consisted of Mr. Charles Mozley and Mr. Lewin Barned Mozley. It had then been recently discovered that the Bank defrauded by more than 100,000£ by a relative of one of the partners. To repair these losses Lewin Barned Mozley brought a further capital of £20,000 into the Bank, |266 and Charles Mozley £100,000. But this latter sum, as afterwards transpired, borrowed from the Bk. o. Engd. on the guarantee of 10 Liverpool merchants, who had taken a mortgage on Charles Mozley’s property for that amount. The business, instead of being, as represented, „a large and continually increasing business“, had for some time previously been carried on without profit, if not on annual loss. The profits were variously stated at different times, but the representations always gross misrepresentations. The profits stated 60 or 70, or 50, or 40,000£ a year. But when more closely looked into – there were no profits at all for the last 3 years. Closely pressed, Mozley said that from the balance sheet prepared in 1865 he was not prepared to say that they had lost money, although he could not say that they had made any profit. At the time of transfer the old firm had lost more than all its capital; carrying on business for several years without any profit; it was under advances to several Liverpool firms, all of whom have since failed to £700,000; and their private property deeply mortgaged to provide the means of keeping the bank afloat. Yet these partners presented their profits at sums varying from 40 to 70,000£ a year. Lewin Barned Mozley said „he had just looked into the thing, and found that 20 000£ would cover the losses of the last 3 years[“]. When Mr. Bencke, one of the directors, evinced a disposition also „just to look into the thing“, he was told by Ch. Mozley that „in transactions of that kind it was unusual and highly improper to ask to see private books of accounts“. „The directors of Barned’s Bk. Co.“, says Ch. Mozley, „never made any inquiry into the private property of the partners in the firm of I. Barned et Co. They had confidence in the position they held, and the property which was patent to the town at large.“ So die new directors duped. The scheme was elaborately planned and cunningly worked out. Of the 40,000 shares, 20,000 or one half, representing 1 Mill. St., were subscribed for, in pursuance of a previous and secret arrangement, by 2 Cos. – Contract Corporation and Joint Stock Discount Co – which had no legal power to subscribe, since then became insolvent, and incapable of performing their engagements. The whole of the debts of this socalled Co, therefore fall upon a limited number of bona fide holders of shares, caught by these gross and fraudulent misrepresentations. Hitherto contributions of enormous amount levied upon these shareholders, until the whole of those placed upon the list of contributories exhausted or utterly ruined, and still the creditors have only received a fraction of their demand. Liquidators wollen nun die packen, die ihre shares verkauft haben within 12 months prior to the winding up order. (aber diese nur liable für debts contracted at the time when they were shareholders.)