John Law's Company
It also absorbed all previous French chartered colonial companies, even though under Law's leadership its overseas operations remained secondary to its domestic financial activity.
[2] Prominent Parisian financier Antoine Crozat, who already controlled the Compagnie de Guinée [fr] and the associated slave trade, eventually established a Company of Louisiana (French: Compagnie de la Louisiane) that was granted a 15-year trading monopoly in the territory by Louis XIV on 14 September 1712.
[2] Crozat had been persuaded to engage in this venture by adventurer Antoine de la Mothe Cadillac, whom he appointed to lead the company.
At the end of the initial 25-year period, the Company would retain ownership of Louisiana but would sell any military assets to the King, including forts and equipment.
[1]: 145 After some nudging by the Regent, the Parlement of Paris registered the edict on 10 September 1717, and the King appointed Law as Director-General two days later.
[1]: 148 The shares were offered at 500 livres face value, payable entirely in government debt bills at par (which was highly advantageous, as with the initial subscription for Law's Bank).
[1]: 146 The public offering started on 14 September 1717 and extended until the end of 1718, for a total 100 million French livres at face value.
It appointed Jean-Baptiste Le Moyne de Bienville as commandant-general of Louisiana's armed forces, who in the spring of 1718 started developing a new settlement which took the name New Orleans in honor of the Regent.
[3]: 15 The company held its first annual general meeting in the Hôtel de Mesmes, the seat of Law's Bank on rue Sainte-Avoye, on 27 March 1719 with the Regent as chair and 300 shareholders in attendance.
[1]: 199 In May 1719, Law expanded his acquisition spree by purchasing the long-bankrupt East Indies Company, as well as the Compagnie de la Chine that had been relaunched in 1712.
[1]: 201 The Compagnie d'Occident reimbursed the two companies' debts and financed the acquisition by issuing new shares underwritten by Law 's Bank, illustrating the growing synergy between the two ventures.
On 21 May 1719, a royal edict issued by the Regent endorsed the transaction and gave the name Compagnie des Indes to the merged entity.
[citation needed] The Mississippi Company arranged ships to bring in 800 more settlers, who landed in Louisiana in 1718, doubling the European population.
[citation needed] Prisoners were set free in Paris from September 1719 onwards, and encouraged by Law to marry young women recruited in hospitals.
[14] The company further purchased the Banque Royale, in February 1720, and the Compagnie de Saint-Domingue [fr] and the monopoly on France's slave trade, in September 1720.
