The Daily News. THURSDAY, JUNE 20, 1912. THE BANK OF NEW ZEALAND.

Taranaki Daily News, Volume LIV, Issue 304, 20 June 1912, Page 4

The Daily News. THURSDAY, JUNE 20, 1912. THE BANK OF NEW ZEALAND.

It is safe to assume that the prosperity of a country is nowhere more quickly reflected than in its banking institutions. Hie two are inseparably connected, and for this reason it is more than gratifying thai; the Bank of Xew Zealand should have been enabled to place such an assuring- balance-sheet before the country as the result of the year's operations. The country, as a substantial shareholder in the Bank, has more than a passing interest in its welfare, and it will be glad to learn that the institution has- this year capped the long series of successes which have characterised its administration since its. reorganisation in 1894, and, indeed, since its original foundation in 1861, by showing a record profit. That profit amounts to £396,182, and after certain customary deductions for interest on guaranteed stock, payment to the Provident Fund, and provision for staff bonuses, the amount remaining for allocation is £331,182, as against £295,270 last year. Deducting the amount of the interim dividend of 5 per cent. ( £00,000), add adding the balance brought forward from last year there l is a sum of £305,587 for present allotment at the end of the financial year. Out of this sum the directors propose to pay a further dividend of -6 per cent, and a bonus of 3 per cent, on ordinary shares, making 15 per cent, for the year, andi a further 4 per cent, on the preference shares, making 10 per cent, for the year. These dividends are the limit allowed by law, and will absorb a sum' of £ 125,000. Of the balance it is proposed to transfer £200,000 to the reserve fund and to carry forward £40,587. The handsome addition made this year to that useful water-tight compartment, the reserve fund; brings it up to the substantial total of £1,200,000, and the Bank has still been able to carry forward as a preliminary for next year's working an exttremelv comfortable balance. It would be impossible to conceive a more satisfactory balance-sheet, and following up over the Biblical limit of seven fat years, it indicates that the Bank is now in such a strong position that it can confidently face the future so firmly established as to be secure from even some extraordinary financial depression which may always lie "in the lap of the gods." It is not necessary to follow the chairman in his lucid address through all the figures pertaining to the business of the Bank, for the public is more interested in the general results to which we have referred than in the methods by which they have been secured. The Bank has taken an active part during the year in supplying accommodation in the Dominion, and this business has been conducted with the maximum of safety and the minimum of loss, although it has, of course, reduced the amount of money available at short call. It is due to the administration to say a waTm word of praise for this eminently satisfactory result, and that the Board realises that the staff is responsible in a large measure for this success is evidenced by the payment to the oflicers of the Bank of a well-earned and handsome bonus. It would be difficult to imagine an institution equipped with a more thoroughly representative and capable business board, and it is

satisfactory to And the chairman, openly admitting that the success of the administration of himself and hi» colleagues is due quite as much to the expansion of settlement and the general prosperity of the country, as it is to their own foresight and capacity. The Bank's interests are, of course, intimately interwoven with those of the Dominion, and Mr. Martin Kennedy does not deem it out of place in his "'financial statement" to find room for an urgent appeal for the closer settlement of the land and for the early resumption of the large areas of native land which at present are not paying their proper proportion of the general prosperity. Banks are all more or less conservative institutions, but there is a vast difference between conservatism and carefulness, but although the Bank has adopted a restrictive policy for some time past the strong demand l for accommodation by the banks and financial institutions of the Dominion has, as the figures indicate, been reasonably responded to. The Bank begins the new year to the accompaniment of a pronounced industrial unrest almost the world over, and a marked! hardening of the money market, but these will be faced, to quote the words of the chairman, "by a policy of maintaining ourselves in a position to meet the legitimate requirements of our established connection and of the Dominion's industries and trade."