Banque Industrielle de Chine
In Beijing, Alexis-Joseph Pernotte, a banker who had lived in China since 1903 and had led the Tianjin branch of the Banque de l'Indochine since 1910,[1]: 52 promoted the project of a new bank, and in July 1912 obtained a preliminary agreement from Prime Minister Lu Zhengxiang and Finance Minister Xiong Xiling that the Chinese government would support the venture and subscribe one-third of its initial capital.
Xiong emphasized the depth of the Paris financial market, which the bank would allow the Chinese government to access for its future borrowing, thus justifying the Franco-Chinese partnership from the standpoint of China's national interest.[1]: 53–54 .
[6] It further opened offices in Tianjin in early 1916,[7] in Hong Kong and Saigon in 1917, and sub-offices of the latter in Hanoi and across the Chinese border in Yunnan-fu (now Kunming) in 1918.
[5] That same year, the bank planned a major new building for its branch in Shanghai, on the corner of the newly created Avenue Edward VII (now Yan'an Road) and the Bund.
[8] In 1918, like the Banque de l'Indochine, it opened an office in Vladivostok to serve the Allied military base there during the Siberian intervention.
[10] By late 1920 it had added more offices in China (Fuzhou, Guangzhou, Hankou, Mukden, and Shantou) and elsewhere (Antwerp, London, Lyon, Marseille, Singapore, and Yokohama).
[12] In late January, the French government and the Bank of France fostered a collective support package with contributions from the government of French Indochina (30 million Francs), the Banque de Paris et des Pays-Bas (22 million), the Banque de l'Indochine (16 million), and other banks (Bankers Trust, Société Générale, Banque Française pour le Commerce et l'Industrie, Rothschilds, Sudameris, Banca Commerciale Italiana, Crédit Foncier d'Algérie et de Tunisie, Banque de la Seine, and Crédit Mobilier Français) for lesser individual amounts adding up to 65 million, to which the government added £150,000 that it had recently withdrawn from the BIC's London branch.
[16] Even before that moment of public salience, in the spring of 1921 when the BIC's financial distress was only known to well-informed Parisian circles, two opposite camps had coalesced around it.
The pro-BIC narrative reminded the bank's difficulties as caused by a general economic and financial crisis in East Asia.
[23] Nevertheless, the former BIC continued to exist as a legal entity, still chaired by Georges Maspero until the late 1930s, even though it was managed by the Franco-Chinese bank headed by André Berthelot;[24] it was eventually wound up in 1950.
[2] Like other foreign banks in China at the time, the Banque Industrielle de Chine issued paper currency in the concessions where it had established branch offices.
