A FINANCIAL CRASH

Wanganui Chronicle, Volume LXXXIII, Issue 19648, 6 September 1926, Page 7

A FINANCIAL CRASH

THOUSANDS FACE RUIN REAL ESTATE COMPANY’S FAILURE SMALL INVESTORS MAY LOSE LIFE SAVINGS “BOOM” DEALS IN FLORIDA. By Telegraph—Per Press Assn.—Copyright. Received Sept. 5, 5.5 p.m. NEW YORK, Hept. 3. The most sensational failure among American financial institutions in the last decade occurred to-day, with the announcement that the affairs of the G. L. Miller Company, dealers in real estate bonds, have been placed in the hands of a receiver. Technically, the liabilities amount tn 6,915,000 dollars and the assets are estimated in the vicinity of 9,000,000 dollars, but behind these ledger figures lurks the possibility of tragedy for more than 25,000 small investors who put their life savings into the company’s securities, the total of which now outstanding is 50,000,000 dollars. The firm was recognised as the second largest first mortgage bond house in America, and its business chiefly consisted of lending large sums of money to builders of flats and offices and structures on first mortgage, and reselling these firms’ indebtednesses to the public in the form of small bonds. It had underwritten property all over the country, and particularly of late in Florida, during the boom there. An attempt was made recently to have the organisation affiliated with Labour organisations, which in the last few years have gone into banking, but the plani never materialised.