Skip to main content

Kansas City, Mexico and Orient Railway Co. Issued to N.M. Rothschild and Sons and Signed by N.M. Rothschild - Stock Certificate

Inv# AG2348   Stock
Kansas City, Mexico and Orient Railway Co. Issued to N.M. Rothschild and Sons and Signed by N.M. Rothschild - Stock Certificate
Country: Mexico
State(s): Kansas
Years: 1906

Stock issued to N.M. Rothschild & Sons and signed on back by N.M. Rothschild.

 

Rothschild & Co is a multinational investment bank and financial services company, and the flagship of the Rothschild banking group controlled by the French and British branches of the Rothschild family.

The banking business of the firm covers the areas of investment banking, restructuring, corporate banking, private equity, asset management, and private banking. It is also known to serve as the advisor and lender to governments and major corporations. In addition, the firm has its own investment account in private equity.

Rothschild's financial advisory division is known to serve British nobility, including the British Royal Family. Past chairman Sir Evelyn Rothschild is the personal financial advisor of Queen Elizabeth II, and she knighted him in 1989 for his services to banking and finance. Rothschild & Co is the result of a merger between the French and British houses of Rothschild, each with individual but intertwined histories. In the late 18th century and early 19th century, Mayer Amschel Rothschild (1744–1812) rose to become one of Europe's most powerful bankers in the Landgraviate of Hesse-Kassel in the Holy Roman Empire. In pursuit of expansion, he appointed his sons to start banking operations in the various capitals of Europe, including sending his third son, Nathan Mayer Rothschild (1777–1836), to England.

Nathan Mayer Rothschild first settled in Manchester, where he established a business in finance and textile trading. He later moved to London, founding N M Rothschild & Sons in 1810 at New Court, which is still the location of Rothschild & Co's headquarters today. Through this company, Nathan Mayer Rothschild made a fortune with his involvement in the Bonds Market.

According to historian Niall Ferguson in 1999, "For most of the nineteenth century, N M Rothschild was part of the biggest bank in the world which dominated the international bond market. For a contemporary equivalent, one has to imagine a merger between Merrill Lynch, Morgan Stanley, JP Morgan Chase & Co. and probably Goldman Sachs too—as well, perhaps, as the International Monetary Fund, given the nineteenth-century Rothschild's role in stabilizing the finances of numerous governments."

During the early part of the 19th century, the Rothschild London bank took a leading part in managing and financing the subsidies that the British government transferred to its allies during the Napoleonic Wars. Through the creation of a network of agents, couriers and shippers, the bank was able to provide funds to the armies of the Duke of Wellington in Portugal and Spain. In 1818 the Rothschild bank arranged a £5 million loan to the Prussian government and the issuing of bonds for government loans. The providing of other innovative and complex financing for government projects formed a mainstay of the bank's business for the better part of the century. N M Rothschild & Sons' financial strength in the City of London became such that by 1825, the bank was able to supply enough coin to the Bank of England to enable it to avert a liquidity crisis.

Like most firms with global operations in the 19th century, Rothschild had links to slavery, even though the firm was instrumental in abolishing it by providing a £15m gilt issue necessary to pass the Slavery Abolition Act of 1833. The money provided by Rothschild was used to pay slave owners compensation for their slaves and the gilt issue was only fully redeemed in 2015.

Nathan Mayer's eldest son, Lionel de Rothschild (1808–1879) succeeded him as head of the London branch. Under Lionel the bank financed the British government's 1875 purchase of a controlling interest in the Suez Canal. Lionel also began to invest in railways as his uncle James had been doing in France. In 1869, Lionel's son, Alfred de Rothschild (1842–1918), became a director of the Bank of England, a post he held for 20 years. Alfred was one of those who represented the British Government at the 1892 International Monetary Conference in Brussels.

The Rothschild bank funded Cecil Rhodes in the development of the British South Africa Company and Leopold de Rothschild (1845–1917) administered Rhodes's estate after his death in 1902 and helped to set up the Rhodes Scholarship scheme at Oxford University. In 1873 de Rothschild Frères (trans. "The Rothschild Brothers") of Paris and N M Rothschild & Sons of London joined with other investors to acquire the Spanish government's money-losing Rio Tinto copper mines. The new owners restructured the company and turned it into a profitable business. By 1905, the Rothschild interest in Rio Tinto amounted to more than 30%. In 1887, the French and English Rothschild banking houses loaned money to, and invested in, the De Beers diamond mines in South Africa, becoming its largest shareholders.

The First World War marked a change of fortune and emphasis for Rothschild. After the War, the Rothschild banks began a steady transition towards advisory work and finance raising for commercial concerns, including the London Underground. In 1938, the Austrian Rothschilds’ interests were given to the Nazis, bringing to an end more than a century at the heart of Central European banking. In France and Austria, the family was scattered for the duration of the Second World War. After the war, the British and French banks committed themselves to further developing their new operation in the United States, which was eventually to become Rothschild Inc, and increased focus on mergers and acquisitions, asset management, and merchant-banking.

In the 20th century, Rothschild developed into a pre-eminent global organisation, which enhanced its ability to secure key advisory roles in some of the most important, complex and recognizable mergers and acquisitions. In the 1980s, Rothschild took a leading role in the international phenomenon of privatization. The company was involved from the beginning and developed a pioneering role which spread out to more than thirty countries worldwide. In recent years, Rothschild advised on nearly a thousand completed mergers and acquisitions with a cumulative value in excess of US$1 trillion. Rothschild also advised on some of the largest and most high-profile corporate restructurings around the world.

The price of gold was fixed for years, twice daily at 10:30 am and 3:00 pm, in a small room at Rothschild's New Court headquarters on St Swithin's Lane. The world's main bullion houses: Deutsche Bank, HSBC, Scotia-Mocatta and Société Générale used the agreed rate as a price benchmark for gold products and derivatives in the world's markets. The chairperson, traditionally appointed by the Rothschild bank, sat in the center, although the bank itself has largely withdrawn from trading. The five members of the London Bullion Association: Barclays Capital, Deutsche Bank, Scotiabank, HSBC and Société Générale, now conduct their twice-daily meetings over the telephone. The meetings were a tradition as great as the ringing of the bell at the New York Stock Exchange until 2004.

The Kansas City, Mexico and Orient Railway, started in 1900 by American railroad entrepreneur Arthur Edward Stilwell, was the predecessor of the Chihuahua al Pacífico railroad in Mexico. It was intended to reach the Pacific Ocean at Topolobampo, Sinaloa.

The United States portion was incorporated in 1900 as the Kansas City, Mexico, and Orient Railway. It was completed between Wichita, Kansas, and Alpine, Texas. Grading took place between El Dorado and Bazaar, Kansas. Primary shops were first located in Fairview, Oklahoma. In 1910, the Fairview shops were destroyed by fire and the shops were then re-established in Wichita. The railroad was forced into bankruptcy in 1912, but its receiver, William T. Kemper, was to make a fortune when oil was discovered under its tracks. In 1914, it was reorganized as the KCM&O Railroad. Another reorganization in 1925 returned it to its original name. It was popularly called The Orient railroad.

At the end of 1925, KCM&O and KCM&O of Texas (the portions of interstate railroads in Texas were required to be under unique charters) together operated 859 miles of track over 738 miles of right of way; they reported a total of 330 million net ton-miles of revenue freight and 8 million passenger-miles. The KCM&O was acquired by the Atchison, Topeka and Santa Fe Railway in 1928, mainly to gain access to the West Texas oil fields. The Santa Fe then sold the Mexican portions. The railway reached Presidio in 1930 and the Presidio–Ojinaga International Rail Bridge was built.

Operating rights on the portion from San Angelo Junction (65 miles NEE of San Angelo) to Presidio (known as South Orient Rail Line) later were awarded to Texas Pacifico Transportation.

Read More

Read Less

Condition: Excellent

A stock certificate is issued by businesses, usually companies. A stock is part of the permanent finance of a business. Normally, they are never repaid, and the investor can recover his/her money only by selling to another investor. Most stocks, or also called shares, earn dividends, at the business's discretion, depending on how well it has traded. A stockholder or shareholder is a part-owner of the business that issued the stock certificates.

Item ordered may not be exact piece shown. All original and authentic.
OUT OF STOCK