PAYMENT SUSPENDED

Evening Post, Volume CXII, Issue 48, 25 August 1931, Page 9

PAYMENT SUSPENDED

PRIMARY PRODUCERS' BANK STATEMENT BY CHAIRMAN SYDNEY, 24th August The Primary Producers' Bank of Australia, Limited, with its headquarters in Sydney, and branches in other States, has suspended payment as from to-day. The shareholders are to be recommended to place the bank in voluntary liquidation. The Chairman of Directors, Mr. H. Schwieger, announced to-night that if ' the bank's securities realised anything i like the bank's valuation, all depositors • ultimately should receive twenty shil- ' lings in. the pound. ' The bank, which was established in ■ 1923, encountered unprecedented diffi- : eulties, he said, accentuated by the pronounced fall in the values of wheat . and other primary produce, the market reduction of security values, such as ■ country lands, and the necessity fox : maintaining advances to farmers; also • steadily declining deposits, a lack of ! adequate capital, and the inability to obtain, temporary accommodation o* to amalgamate with any other financial . institution. : While most of the bank's clients are '■ unable to reduce their indebtedness in the slightest degree, there iB no alterna- • tive, added Mr. Schwieger, but to close ' the bank's doors. The bank's paid-up capital is £489,401. < The deposits at the time of the last balance-sheet, in February, amounted ', to £1,483,845, and its assets totalled £2,102,443, of which bills discounted, loans, advances, and other assets accounted for £1,592,318. The bank held £376,086 in liquid assets, including £37,890- in cash, £92,000 at short call, and £145,678 in Commonwealth bonds. Mr. Schweiger added that his bank had also been seriously prejudiced by the closing of the Government Savings Bank of New South Wales. i