the world of private banking
the world of private banking
the world of private banking
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166<br />
THE WORLD OF PRIVAtE BANKING<br />
companies were only very reluctantly granted, <strong>banking</strong> concessions were almost<br />
always rejected until <strong>the</strong> 1860s. 22<br />
A major exception was <strong>the</strong> Bayerische Hypo<strong>the</strong>ken- und Wechselbank,<br />
founded in 1835. This bank, a combination <strong>of</strong> mortgage bank, discount house<br />
and bank <strong>of</strong> issue was founded on <strong>the</strong> initiative <strong>of</strong> <strong>the</strong> Bavarian King. At first, <strong>the</strong><br />
Munich and Augsburg bankers, including <strong>the</strong> court banker Simon von Eichthal,<br />
were not prepared to subscribe <strong>the</strong> bank’s capital, but <strong>the</strong> King succeeded in<br />
interesting <strong>the</strong> Frankfurt banker Carl von Rothschild and thus forced all major<br />
Bavarian bankers to join <strong>the</strong> initiative. Eichthal even became one <strong>of</strong> <strong>the</strong> bank’s<br />
two honorary directors. 23<br />
Occasionally, joint-stock banks were founded by <strong>the</strong> conversion <strong>of</strong> existing<br />
<strong>private</strong> <strong>banking</strong> houses – in some cases because <strong>the</strong> family business with its limited<br />
resources could no longer withstand <strong>the</strong>ir customers’ demand for capital and credit<br />
and in some cases because <strong>the</strong> family was no longer in a position to supply able<br />
successors when senior partners retired. Two examples are outstanding. The<br />
Bayerische Vereinsbank was founded by taking over <strong>the</strong> business <strong>of</strong> <strong>the</strong> leading<br />
Munich bank, Robert von Froelich & Co. (formerly known as A.E. von Eichthal), 24<br />
and <strong>the</strong> Dresdner Bank was established by <strong>the</strong> conversion <strong>of</strong> <strong>the</strong> Dresden <strong>private</strong><br />
bank Michael Kaskel. Kaskel was one <strong>of</strong> <strong>the</strong> very few successors <strong>of</strong> former court<br />
Jews who successfully transformed <strong>the</strong>ir business not only into State financing,<br />
but also towards granting credits to modern industry and transport. Carl Kaskel,<br />
a bro<strong>the</strong>r-in-law <strong>of</strong> Simon Oppenheim, had also been a railway promoter and<br />
became <strong>the</strong> supervisory-board chairman <strong>of</strong> <strong>the</strong> Austrian Aussig-Teplitzer Railway<br />
Company. As in many o<strong>the</strong>r cases, <strong>the</strong> successor problem determined <strong>the</strong> fate <strong>of</strong><br />
this bank too. The family decided to join <strong>the</strong> Dresden <strong>banking</strong> house Gutmann<br />
and to convert <strong>the</strong> business into a joint-stock bank. Although Gutmann had been<br />
a much smaller bank, it had recently overcome <strong>the</strong> generation break thanks to<br />
an able and enterprising young family member, Eugen Gutmann. While <strong>the</strong><br />
senior member <strong>of</strong> <strong>the</strong> Kaskel family, Felix Kaskel, was elected supervisory-board<br />
chairman, Gutmann became a member <strong>of</strong> <strong>the</strong> Dresdner Bank executive board; 25 he<br />
kept <strong>the</strong> position as head <strong>of</strong> <strong>the</strong> bank for more than forty years.<br />
22<br />
J.M. Brophy, Capitalism, Politics, and Railroads in Prussia 1830–1970 (Columbus,<br />
1998), pp. 87–106.<br />
23<br />
F. Jungmann-Stadler, ‘Die Gründung der Bayerischen Hypo<strong>the</strong>ken- und<br />
Wechselbank 1834/35’, in Zeitschrift für Bayerische Landesgeschichte, vol. 60, 1997, pp.<br />
889–924, here p. 920.<br />
24<br />
M. Pohl, Konzentration im deutschen Bankwesen (1848–1980) (Frankfurt/Main,<br />
1982), p. 39.<br />
25<br />
J. Kaskel, ‘Vom H<strong>of</strong>faktor zur Dresdner Bank: Die Unternehmerfamilie Kaskel im 18.<br />
und 19. Jahrhundert‘, in Zeitschrift für Unternehmensgeschichte, vol. 28, 1983, pp. 159–87,<br />
here p. 162; D. Ziegler, ‘Eugen Gutmann – Unternehmer und Großbürger‘, in Eugen-Gutmann-<br />
Gesellschaft – Gründungsversammlung (Frankfurt/Main, 2003, unpublished), p. 23.