BANK OF, NEW ZEALAND.

Taranaki Herald, Volume X, Issue 491, 28 December 1861, Page 3

BANK OF, NEW ZEALAND.

The success which has attended the establishment of the Bank of New Zealand has been most signal. The head office, opened here on 16th September, has done a large and increasing business. In the South the Bank has been well supported. The local agency on the Otago gold fields, and the branch office at Dunedin, have done much to link the commercial prosperity of that province with this first great colonial undertaking. By doing their business with the New Zealand Bank the mercantile men of the South know they retain .and multiply capital among themselves, and hence the marked preference it has received at their hands. By the last down steamer from the Manukau two gentlemen were dispatched from Auckland to the Dunedin office, the staff there not having been complete. Mr. Kennedy the efficient general manager of the Bank, also went South by the Lord Worsley. His special mission is to establish a branch office at Wellington, where the most perfect unanimity may be said to exist in relation to the Bank project. A local board will, manage these offices, we believe. At New Plymouth' a branch office has already been opened, and deposits to a very large amount, considering the population and circumstances of the province of Taranaki, have been lodged. Our friends in New Plymouth express themselves very well satisfied at the Bank accommodation afforded them, and there is reason to believe that the prosperity of the settlement, should security to life and property be guaranteed, will be materially advanced by the fostering care of the New Zealand Bank proprietary. The good people of Nelson have at last bestirred themselves. A public meeting has been held in Nelson, presided over by Mr. Stafford, late Colonial Secretary, to consider the points for and against the scheme of a colonial bank for New Zealand. The very explicit and able statement of Mr. Stafford was listened to with great attention, and an impression in favor of the undertaking was produced. The Nelson Examiner ably discusses the subject of banking, and points out the serious drawbacks to this cqlony from the system hitherto pursued, and which swelled the dividend of one bank at least much moie than any other of its agencies in proportion to the capital stock employed in the business. But those palmy days have gone past ; and with Nelson and Canterbury firmly attached to the Bank of New Zealand, the project will not merely be highly remunerating to the proprietors, but beneficial to our entire commercial, agricultural, and, pastoral interests. Mr. Thomas Russell has also gone South, and we may reasonably suppose that he will not lose an opportunity of bearing testimony to the profit the sister provinces will derive by having branches of the colonial bank established in their respective settlements. Hitherto our commerce has not been fostered by the banks, but after a reasonable time has elapsed to allow the directors of the New Zealand Bank to mature their plans, and carry out their organisations, that complaint will cease to have force. All reasonable encouragement will be given to merchants, traders, manufacturers, and farmers j and instead of the profit on deposits leaving the country without giving any return, it will be retained in the community to stimulate our commerce. Hawke's

Bay and Marlborough, and the more distant Invercargill will ha/c the benefits of banking extended to them in due time, so that specie, which is the life blood of trade, shall circulate freely for the welfare of the entire community, through every artery of commerce. , The colonists have given proof of understanding the value, of this local circulation of money by subscribing nearly the entire capital stock of the company. It was at fiist proposed to send to England to obtain subscription for 10,000 shares of the bank stock, but all the directors have been able to forward to the English market has been half that amount of shares, and these were withdrawn with some difficulty from the capitalists of the colony. For many reasons it is well to test the feeling of English capitalists on this matter, ( and we will not be surprised to find that the shares are at a premium in the English market as soon as the stock has been finally underwritten. — Southern Cross, Decembei 13.