Better Banking

The week that the Democratic Party assembled in Chicago to nominate Franklin D. Roosevelt in 1932 was the worst Depression week in Chicago banking. Nervous depositors swarmed into even the biggest Loop banks, demanded their money. Runs hit good banks and bad alike. That was the week that Charles Gates Dawes negotiated his notorious $90,000,000 RFC loan for his now defunct Central Republic. Long queues in the main banking rooms of First National were not dispersed until President Melvin Alvah Traylor addressed the crowd, explaining that he had enough cash for each & every depositor, that First National had weathered the Chicago Fire, had weathered other depressions, would weather this one.

It did. But Melvin Traylor did not live to see the solvency his bank evinced last week. First National directors transferred a special $5,000,000 Depression reserve back to surplus, voted to retire $10,000,000 of the $25,000,000 of preferred stock sold to RFC, declared in advance three quarterly payments of $1 each on the common stock, announced that this action established a regular $4 annual dividend rate". It was First National's first dividend since 1932.

Grouse though they still do about low interest rates, bankers are currently making a little more money. Chicago's Harris Trust & Savings last week upped its regular dividend rate from 6% to 8%. Manhattan's Manufacturers Trust Co. paid a 25-c- extra. Marine Midland, big New York State group holding company, sweetened its regular with a 15-c- extra. Amadeo Peter Giannini's billion-dollar Bank of America National Trust & Savings Association in San Francisco declared a regular quarterly dividend of $1,250,000, an extra of $1,000,000. A big RFC borrower a few years ago, Bank of America is 99.64% owned by Transamerica Corp. Reflecting better banking, chiefly in California, Transamerica Corp. has lately been a feature of the San Francisco Stock Exchange, rising from the year's low of $4.88 per share to $13.75.

This file is automatically generated by a robot program, so reader's discretion is required.