The shareholders of the Trust and Loan Company of China, Japan, and the Straits, Limited, held their first' annual - general meeting on February 12th at Cannon-afreet Hotel, E.C., Mr. William Keawick (the chairman) presiding, ities The Secretary (Mr. Charles H. Campbell) having read the notice convening the meeting; The Chairman said: In moving the adoption of the report, which, if you approve, we shall take as read, I have not very much to add to it, but a few words of reference are necessary in connection with some of the subjects mentioned in it, and in consideration of this being our first annual meeting and the report and statement of counts being the first that have been submitted t" you, In the first place, I may mention that it was on December 6th, 1889, that tle company was registered, and that the allotment of shares took place a fortnight later, The instalments of 253, in all per share and the premium of 10s. per share were in every case promptly paid. The expenses, preliminary, in form ing the company were, fortunately, very moderate, and out of the £50,000 received as premium the board have been able to carry £45,000 to reserve fund. You will understand that in establishing our head office with competent staff, in opening branches at Hongkong and Shanghai and supplying them with suitable managers, in appointing ayonts elsewhere, and in generally preparing for the proper conduct ut the business, a considerable time was necessarily occupied, and that, cuns quently, the working' period of the company covered by the accounts falls considerably short of 12 months. You will notice that, in order to be in a position to place before you as early in the year as possible a statement of the position the company, it was necessary to close accounts in the East on October Slst—a date which will be adhered to in future, but which will then, of course, imply twelve tenths' working in the Eust, so that, as on this occasion, you way be informed early in February every year how the business prospers. Under the circumstances, therefure, that 1 have mentioned, the directors feel confident you will share with them the satisfaction that the account presented to you to-day chow such profit able results, and so emphatically con the opinion we have held of the promising character of the business the company was organised to undertake. The net. profit slightly exceed £87,000; and out of th sum the directors recommend that £55,000 should be carried to reserve fund, an appropriation which, with the £45,000 previously mentioned, will bring that fund up in the first year of the company's existence to the respectable figure of £100,000—(cheors)—and Iueed not point out the importance of that fund being strengthened continuously, when it is borne in mind that the shares of the company are not fully paid up. In mentioning the result of last year's operations, I should not omit to tell you, gentlemen, that, in realising the profits we have made, circumstances favoured us not a little at the time the company was established, and that the dearness of money fur a considerable period of last year, and also the fluctuations in silver, enabled the buard to make good disposition of the capital and of other funds at their dist in carrying out operations and in min investments in India and the Straits, China and Japan, where on mo} on real estate and advances on solid securities we have been able to find satisfactory employment fur money.
It is in the last almost exclusively that we have found a field for cur operations,
Text read from the printed page and cleaned; old type leaves the occasional error.