Lenin: 1916/ni-alpha: STILLICH, MONEY AND BANKING (original) (raw)

Vladimir Ilyich Lenin

NOTEBOOK “α”

(“ALPHA”)

STILLICH, MONEY AND BANKING

Dr. Oskar Stillich, Money and Banking, Berlin, 1907.

A **super-**popular piece.

| a Proudhonistfool and bankeragainst money | | | | p. 95. Banker Julius Hucke, The MoneyProblem and the Social Question (5th edi-tion), 1903. | | ----------------------------------------- | | | | --------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- |

p. 143: “No banking operation brings in such high profit as the issue of securities.”[1] Profits from the issue of securities are higher than anywhere else.... There have been attempts to justify profits from the issue of industrial shares by pleading expenses and anticipated higher returns, but in reality this is economically unearned profit, and according to the Deutsche Oekonomist it amounts, on an average:

| | | | | | | | | | | | | | | ----- | ----- | ----- | ----- | ----- | | | ---- | | | ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------ | | | N.B. | | | 1895— | 38.6% | | | N.B. | | | idem more fully in Sombart, The German National Economy in theNineteenth Century (2nd edition,1909), p. 526, appen-dix 8 | | | 1896— | 36.1% | | | | | | | | | | | | 1897— | 66.7% | | | | | | | | | | | | 1898— | 67.7% | | | | | | | | | | | | | | 1899— | 66.9% | | | | | | | | | | | | | 1900— | 55.2% | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | |

| N.B. | | | “In the ten years, from 1891 to 1900, more than a thousand million marks were ‘earned’ by issuing German industrial stock.”[2] | | ---- | | | ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- |

| | p. 138. “_Reconstructions_”.... “Sharesare amalgamated and their nominal valuedecreased. A classic example of such writingdown of share capital is the DortmundUnion founded by the Discontogesellschaft.In the first volume of my Economic Studiesin Big Industrial Enterprise (Leipzig, 1904),I examined in detail the financial historyof the unfortunate offspring of this bank. Inthe course of thirty years, more than 73,000,000marks were written off the books of the Unionby a series of operations decreasing the nomi-nal value of shares. At the present time theoriginal shareholders of the company possessonly 5 per cent of the nominal value of theirshares (138)[3] | | | | | --------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- | | | -------------- | | N.B. | | | | | | | | | goodexample!!! | | | | | | !!! |

_Current Accounts_—a means of exerting influence on industry.

| “How great the banks’ influence over theirclients is shown, for example, by the fol-lowing letter, reproduced from the Kuxen-zeitung, sent on November 19, 1901 by the Dresdner Bank to the Board of the GermanNorth-West Cement Syndicate. The letterstates: “As we learn from the notice you pub-lished in the newspaper Reichsanzeiger ofNovember 18, we must reckon with the possi-bility that the next general meeting of yoursyndicate, to be held on the 30th of thismonth, may decide on measures which arelikely to effect changes in your enterprisewhich are unacceptable to us. We deeplyregret that, for these reasons, we are obligedhenceforth to withdraw the credit whichhas hitherto been allowed you. Accordingly,we ask you to cease requests for moneyfrom our bank and at the same time we respect-fully ask you to return not later than the endof the current month the sums owing to us.But if the said next general meeting does notdecide upon measures which are unacceptableto us, and if we receive suitable guarantees onthis matter for the future, we shall he quitewilling to open negotiations with you on thegrant of a new credit”[4] (146-47). | | | | ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- | | -------------- | | | | | goodexample!!! | | | | | !! | | | | | | | | | !!! |

| goodexample | | | | | | ----------- | | | | ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------ | | !!! | | | | ...“The daily occupation of a number ofemployees in our big banks consists solely ofcalculating the interest on current accounts.In the course of time they achieve real virtu-osity in this matter.... They are an example ofhow capital suppresses personality and turnsthe individual into a machine” (148).... | | !! | | | | | | | | | | |

| N.B. | | | “‘_Every bank is a Stock Ex-change_’, and the bigger the bank, and themore successful the concentration of banking,the truer does this modern aphorism ring”(169).[5] | | ---- | | | ---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- | | | | | |

| ha-ha!!cf. K. Ka-ustky | | | | | “Through their subsidiary banks the _Pereires_”(founders of Crédit Mobilier) “wanted toentangle various nations financially and inthis way promote world peace” (180).... | | ---------------------- | | | | | ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- |

“Spheres of operation” “for bank capital”

in the seventies—German railways (nationalised at the close of the seventies)

in the eighties—Rhine-Westphalian heavy industry

in the nineties—electrical industry (and engineering).

| attitudetoemployees | | | “In 1906 the four Berlin “D” banks (DeutscheBank, Discontogesellschaft, Dresdner Bank,Darmstädter Bank) concluded an agreementnot to engage an employee of any of thesebanks who had not been freed from his post!”(203). The opposition of the employees com-pelled a “substantial” (??) “modification”(??) of this agreement ((in what respect?how????)). | | ------------------- | | | ----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- | | | | | |

End

N.B.: H. Withers, Money and Credit in England, 1911.
Philippovich
Sombart
Principles of Social Economics (Bücher, Schulze-Gaevernitz, etc., etc.).

Notes

[1] See present edition, Vol. 22, p. 234.—Ed.

[2] Ibid., p. 234.—Ed.

[3] Ibid., p. 235.—Ed.

[4] Ibid., pp. 223-24.—Ed.

[5] See present edition, Vol. 22, p. 215.—Ed.