MEGAdigital. Online-Angebot der historisch-kritischen Gesamtausgabe von Karl Marx und Friedrich Engels

19 December 1868.

Shareholders. Zusatz von Marx.
Schließen (Frauds of Directors in voluntary „Windings’ up“.[)]

During the last 3 or 4 years shareholders in Railway and other Jt. Stock Cos. robbed and defrauded to extent of many Mill. £. St. In a great number of cases the robberies and frauds unequivocal and indubitable. The fleeced victims have been able to discern, in the light of subsequent events, how the frauds were perpetrated and who were the perpetrators. They have not only known how much they have lost, but also who has got it. They have seen many of the persons by whom |55 they have been defrauded suddenly becoming rich, and madly rushing into all sorts of questionable speculations … The money thus transferred from the unfortunate class of shareholders to the more fortunate class of promoters and directors, has been so transferred in too many instances by fraud and falsehood, by deceit and misrepresentation, and the means by which the fraudulent transfer has been effected are equally well known. But where are the laws that define the crimes and award the punishment? where the prosecutors who should enforce the laws? … With regard to the numerous frauds upon Jt. Stock Co. Shareholders which the events of the last 3 years have brought to light, and which involved many 100ds of delinquents, only some 3 or 4 prosecutions have taken place, and only 3 or 4 of the culprits have been convicted, while of those convicted two were speedily released from further deserved punishment by the Queen’s Pardon. Even her Majesty, who never dreams of pardoning a thief or burglar, or common swindler, is made to seem to sympathise with the sufferings of culprits whose crime is swindling and defrauding 100ds or 1000ds of hapless shareholders.

Individual shareholders standing alone are but individual units – helpless and defenceless, as regards any combination that may be formed against them. Promoters and directors know this; and, knowing it, combine together to take advantage of it – and invariably succeed. The Joint Stock Co. shareholder is essentially a selfish animal. … The number of Cos. now undergoing the process of winding up, under the fostering but fatal care of the Court of Chancery – many of the liquidations being in the hands of the very persons who originated the Cos. and conducted them to ruin – imperatively requires that some means should be devised for protecting the unfortunate shareholders against calls and demands which, in too many instances, are both unreasonable and unlawful. In many cases where Cos. are winding up under compulsory orders, the proceedings are being procrastinated and the costs of winding up increased to an enormous and ruinous extent. In other cases which are being wound up „voluntarily“, … frauds of the most outrageous and unmitigated character are being perpetrated by quondam directors, who are now officiating as liquidators. In one recent case, property of the value of £5,000 has been sold and disposed of by the liquidator for £150. In other cases frauds of a similar or varied kind are being perpetrated, without question or hinderance, simply because individual shareholders feel themselves powerless to act alone, or can only act alone at great cost and risk, and have no means of acting in combination with their fellow sufferers. An organised combination of shareholders for their mutual protection now intended. ⦗Meeting deßwegen, Resolutions etc⦘

The Railway Returns of the Board of Trade. (Published end 1868)

Umfaßt 18 Jahre.

Number of miles in Operation.
	Double Line.	Single Line.	Total
1849	5,034	998	6,032
1867	7,844	6,403	14,247
Increase in 19 years	2,810	5,405	8,215


	1849	1867.	Increase in 19 years.	Average yearly Investment of fresh Capital
Capital paid up	£229,747,797	£502,262,887	£272,515,108	£14,290,000
Average Cost p. Mile of Rail in operation:	£.38,088	35,113 showing apparent decrease of £2,975 p. mile; not accurate, as the capital paid up at both periods was applied more or less to unproductive works und proportion of single line larger at the close of 19 years’ period.
Traffic Receipts from all sources:	£11,806,498	£39,479,999	Incr. of £27,673,501 or Average Increase of £1,456,400 per Annum.
Gross Revenue per Mile	£1,957	£2,770	Increase of £813 p. mile. Gross Revenue p. mile 411/2% higher in 1867 than in 1849, with a gradual but uniform improvement every year.\|


	1852 (Erst von diesem Jahr number of miles run by trains returned by Board of Trade)	1853	1856	1867.
Average Receipt per train mile	5s. 2d.	5s. 5d.	5s. 111/4d.	5s. 33/4d.
	Notwithstanding, therefore, the increase of 411/2 pct. in the receipt per mile in the 19 years. years, there was for 16 years rather a decrease in the receipt per train mile. In other words, the diminished receipt per train mile, by contrast with the largely increased receipt per mile, indicates conclusively that more work was done for the money earned; and herein consists another reason for the comparative depression of British railway Property. Railways have run too many trains and have done too much work for the return in money. Worn out with competition, and with unnecessary expenditure upon too frequent and badly filled trains.
	1860		1867
Working Expenses; Average Rate on Receipts	47%		50%
		Cost of working has undergone no diminution relatively to the traffic receipt but has rather increased.

Heaton’s Iron and Steel.

As one of the points of opposition, asserted that the strength of the iron and steel produced may prove inferior to those produced by other processes, such as Bessemer’s. Facts most decisively contradict this. (d.h. the recent experiments.)

Heaton’s process uses the poorest ores, Bessemer’s only the richest ones. The majority of the ores in the iron bearing districts are poor – that is, the they contain phosphorus and sulphur in abundance; and neither puddling nor any mechanical process yet discovered can remove these deteriorating ingredients. The admission of atmospheric air is powerless against them; otherwise Bessemer would have been able to extend his process indefinitely. Chemistry alone supplies the means of neutralising and removing them. Von Marx übernommen in Manuskript II zum zweiten Buch des „Kapital“ (MEGA² II/11. S. 194.32–35).
Schließen The plant needful to carry out Heaton’s process is absolutely inexpensive. The smallest ironmaster may command it; but only the greatest ironmasters can command the capital and appliances requisite for the pneumatic process. 8 Advantages of Heatons system: It deals with cheapest raw material; it produces steel direct from pig iron; the plant is inexpensive; the cost of maintenance of the plant is insignificant; the waste of material in conversion is almost nil; puddling is dispensed with; the process of conversion is simple, rapid and, certain; the results are remarkable for their uniformity. No preceding invention connected with the manufacture has offered such a combination of advantages. … Will strongly tend to revolutionise the iron manufacture.

Collieries in U. Kingd. Insurance.

Existirt bis jezt keine Insurance gegen Collieries’ Accidents. Capital in Collieries 100–150 Mill. £. St. mit net income of £30,000,000, besides giving wages to upwards of 300,000 men.

Times 21. Dec. 1866 Mr. Lonsdale Bradley made propositions, as to Insurance. Hat für Jahre diesen Gegenstand verfolgt. Apparent difficulty to discover a sufficient average against loss, so as to ascertain the exact risks of the Assurers. Prosecuting his inquiries during long period, and carefully examining all the conditions that lead to loss of life and property in coal mines, he ascertained that such a recurrence of accidents prevailed as indicated the operation of a law uniform in its action when spread over a long period. Though apparently capricious and irregular, colliery accidents, when examined over a long period, are found subject to averages exactly as vital [as] statistics are; and, assured of this, they certainly ought to be provided against in the same way. Bradley further discovered, that from all causes there are annually not less than 900 accidents involving the loss of life, and that about 1000 colliers are killed every year. With great labour, but within very small limits of error, the costs of accidents from explosions, fires, fall of roofs, inundations, and breaking of machinery, have also been ascertained. In 1865 there were 3,268 collieries in U. Kingd., employing 307,542 miners, who produced 98,150,587 tons of coal, valued at the pit’s mouth, at £24,537,646. Small premium upon either of these large quantities would be sufficient to produce an income to defray the costs of accidents to property, and to support the widows and children of the miners killed until in situation to provide for themselves. … In collieries, the supervision exercised by an Insurance Co. would be an addition to the means of providing against accidents.

Cotton Trade. (Stokes, Mc Haffie, et Co.) (New York)

With every prospect of free receipts at the ports caused by present high prices, and with a visible supply of cotton, only about 71/2 P.Ct. below last year (1867), our prices are 45 P.Ct. above the same date in 1867.

The Currency of Sovereigns and Half Sovereigns in India.

Notification of Financial Department, Simla, October 28, 1868: In modification of the notification of 23 Nov. 1864, vor und after this new notification, sovereigns and half sovereigns coined at any authorised royal mint in England and Australia of current weight shall be received in all Treasuries of British India and its dependencies in payment of sums due to the Gvt., as equivalent of 10 Rupees and 4 Annas, and 5 Rupees and 2 Annas, respectively. They shall, whenever available at any Gvt. treasury, be paid at the same rates to any persons willing to receive them in payment of claims against the Gvt. The gold pieces stated in Sect. 13 of Act 17 of 1835 will also henceforth be received as above according to the values stated in that Act. Gazette of India, Oct. 31.|