the world of private banking

GERmAN PRIVAtE BANKS AND GERmAN INDUStRy, 1830–1938 171
AV a £100,000 sterling credit, granted by a group of London bankers. Not only
was this credit renewed several times during 1924/25, but Hirschland also acted
as an intermediary for further credits, variously denominated in either Sterling or
Dollars, supplied internationally to Gutehoffnungshütte. The Essen bank obtained
comparable facilities for Mannesmann Röhrenwerke, August Thyssen-Hütte,
Gelsenkirchener Bergwerks AG, Rheinisch-Westfälische Elektrizitätswerke,
Klöckner, Phoenix, Krupp and Vereinigte Stahlwerke. 39
No less important than Hirschland in the intermediation of foreign capital
– in this case particularly US capital – were Warburg, the Hamburg bankers. Paul
Warburg, a brother of the Hamburg banker Max, was a founder of the International
Acceptance Bank, established in New York in 1921, which specialized in granting
dollar-denominated credits to foreign industrial concerns. The International
Acceptance Bank not only collaborated with the Equitable Trust Company, one of
the largest New York banks, but also had an interest in the banking house Dillon,
Read & Co., one of the most important New York issuing houses. Several German
industrial companies (Thyssen, Rheinelbe-Union and Vereinigte Stahlwerke)
utilized the connection between M.M. Warburg & Co., the International Acceptance
Bank and Dillon Read to issue stock in New York on substantially better terms
than those then obtainable in Germany. 40
There are other examples of private banking houses putting their international
contacts at the disposal of their industrial customers. Sal. Oppenheim jr. & Cie.,
which had traditional close ties with French banks, negotiated franc-denominated
credits for German customers during inflation and stabilization. Even Mendelssohn
& Co., which had terminated its contact with industrial customers in the 1870s,
obtained foreign credits for some large industrial customers (Phoenix and
Vereinigte Stahlwerke) between 1924 and 1932 through its Amsterdam 41 and New
York branches. 42
39
H. Wixforth, Banken und Schwerindustrie in der Weimarer Republik (Cologne,
1995), pp. 118, 138; K. Ulrich, ‘Von Simon Hirschland zu Burkhardt & Co.: Die Geschichte
des traditionsreichsten Bankhauses des Ruhrgebietes’, in J.-P. Barbian and L. Heid (eds),
Die Entstehung des Ruhrgebietes (Düsseldorf, 1996), pp. 430–33; K. Ulrich, Aufstieg und
Fall der Privatbankiers: Die wirtschaftliche Entwicklung von 1918 bis 1938 (Frankfurt/
Main, 1998), pp. 115–18.
40
R. Chernow, Die Warburgs: Odyssee einer Familie (Berlin, 1994), p. 285; Ulrich,
Aufstieg, pp. 106–8; E. Kleßmann, M.M. Warburg & Co.: Die Geschichte eines Bankhauses
(Hamburg, 1999), p. 77.
41
The Amsterdam new-issue market was dominated by two syndicates. The most
important syndicate, responsible for a market share of about 40 per cent during the second half
of the 1920s, consisted of the Nederlandsche Handel Maatschappij, Pierson & Co., Mees &
Zoonen and Mendelssohn & Co. See C. Kreutzmüller, Händler und Handlungsgehilfen: Der
Finanzplatz Amsterdam und die deutschen Großbanken (1918–1945) (Stuttgart, 2005), p. 42.
42
Wixforth et al., ‘Niche’, p. 115.