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Updated: June 9, 2025
Before this question has been under discussion for a minute comes a name for a time I was really quite unable to decide whether it is the name of the villain in the piece or of the maligned heroine, or a secret society or a gold mine, or a pestilence or a delusion the name of the Banca Commerciale Italiana.
This great bank, the Banca Commerciale Italiana, is a bank of the German type: to begin with, it was certainly dominated by German directors; it was a bank of stimulation, and its activities interweave now into the whole fabric of Italian commercial life. But it has already liberated itself from German influence, and the bulk of its capital is Italian.
One of its leading lending banks the Banca Commerciale was a German concern. Most of its newer developments had been accomplished with German capital, were run by German engineers, equipped with German machines. Germany has bitterly reproached her former ally for the "ingratitude" of siding against the people who had brought her prosperity.
Here's the programme, my dear girls: One of you must go by first train to Messina and cable Isham, Marvin & Co. to deposit with the New York correspondents of the Banca Commerciale Italiana fifty thousand dollars, and have instructions cabled to the Messina branch of that bank to pay the sum to the written order of John Merrick. This should all be accomplished within twenty-four hours.
Being intelligent and enterprising, their influence on local politics is irresistible, and it was uniformly employed in those interests which it was the object of the Banca Commerciale to further.
Merrick was arrested for the first time in his life, an experience he never afterward forgot. Bad money is so common in Naples that Uncle John never accepted any change from anyone, but obtained all his silver coins and notes directly from the Banca Commerciale Italiana, a government institution.
Nevertheless I found discussion ranging about firstly what the Banca Commerciale essentially was, secondly what it might become, thirdly what it might do, and fourthly what, if anything, had to be done to it. It is a novelty to an English mind to find banking thus mixed up with politics, but it is not a novelty in Italy.
To German customers and those Italians who imported German goods, the Banca Commerciale allowed long credits and easy means of payment. To all who were in need of implements, machinery, or materials for a new enterprise, the bank "recommended" German houses, and those who were wise construed the "recommendation" as an ultimatum.
In the Near East, where so many of Italy's interests are now concentrated, the Societa Commerciale d'Oriente of Constantinople, being one of the agencies of the Banca Commerciale, was also one of the canals through which this influence passed.
The Banca Commerciale, having obtained that supremacy, forced the Italian companies to lead a languishing existence in straitened circumstances, whereas they might easily have grown rich and flourishing. It permits our steamship companies to subsist and even to earn somewhat, but only just enough to suffice for the declaration of a modest dividend.
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