1726: Jakob Friedrich Gontard gründet in Frankfurt das Bankhaus Gontard. Schwerpunkte sind der Handel mit Waren und dessen Finanzierung sowie die Herausgabe von Staatsanleihen.
1875: Das angeschlagene Bankhaus Cohen wird in die Metallgesellschaft überführt. Daraus entsteht 1906 die Berg- und Metallbank. Sie begleitet Bergwerksunternehmen an die Börse.
1996: Goldzack-Großaktionär Dietrich Walther, der Firmen an die Börse begleitet, erwirbt das Bankhaus Heinrich Gontard und zwei Jahre später von der Schmidt-Bank die Metallbank. Diese fusionieren zur Gontard & Metallbank.
Seit 2002: Der Börsencrash wird der Bank zum Verhängnis: Insolvenzverfahren beim Amtsgericht Frankfurt.
1726 - Jakob Friedrich Gontard gründet das Handelshaus "Jakob Friedrich Gontard & Söhne", das auch Bankgeschäfte betreibt.
1815 - Heinrich Gontard (1787-1826), Sohn von Susette Gontard, gliederte das Bankgeschäft aus in die "Heinrich Gontard & Co."
Ca. 1999 - fusionierte das Bankhaus Gontard mit der Metallbank zur Gontard & Metallbank AG
Die Gontards wohnten im großzügigen, fast an ein Schloss erinnernden Anwesen zum Weißen Hirsch am Großen Hirschgraben Nr. 3. Der Große Hirschgraben war damals eine der besten Adressen Frankfurts – bis 1795, dem Jahr von Hölderlins Ankunft, wohnte hier auch die Familie Goethe. Heute ist die Bebauung an der Stelle, an der der Weiße Hirsch stand, gesichtslos. Am 22.3.1944, dem 112. Todestag Goethes, wurden alle Gebäude in der Straße bei einem Bombenangriff zerstört oder schwer beschädigt. Anders als das Goethehaus – das auch das Geburtshaus Goethes war – wurde das damals den Gontards gehörende Anwesen nach dem Krieg nicht wieder aufgebaut. Geschichte
BANQUE D’OUTREMER: https://www.bnpparibasfortis.com/docs/default-source/pdf-(en)/history-and-art-heritage/eng-inventaire-banque-d-39-outremer.pdf?sfvrsn=2
Banque Bruxelles Lambert: https://search.arch.be/fr/producteurs-darchives/resultats?view=eac&identity_entitytype=family&languagecode=fre&inLanguageCode=FRE&languageCode=DUT&start=194
Banque Bruxelles Lambert, Banque Lambert und Banque de Bruxelles: https://about.ing.be/en/ing-belgium/history.htm
Banque Lambert und Banque de Bruxelles: http://www.fundinguniverse.com/company-histories/bank-brussels-lambert-history/
Banque Lambert: .wikiwand.com/en/L%C3%A9on_Lambert
Banque Commerciale de Lausanne (Gegründet) 1962 Jacque Kimche, dann seit 1971 Banque Lambert (Suisse) SA, Lausanne, dann seit 1976 Banque Bruxelles Lambert (Suisse) SA, Lausanne: https://www.monetas.ch/en/647/Firmendaten-ING-Bank-Suisse-SA.htm?subj=610964
mini|Ehemaliger Sitz der Banque de Bruxelles in Brüssel
Die Banque de Bruxelles (Flämisch: „Bank van Brussel“) war eine international tätige belgische Großbank mit Sitz in Brüssel.
Geschichte Bearbeiten
Die Bank wurde auf Initiative des Bankiers Jacques Errera-Oppenheim (1834-1880) am 13. November 1871 in Brüssel gegründet. Das Grundkapital wurde auf 50 Millionen Belgische Franken festgesetzt und war auf 100.000 Aktien von je 500 Belgische Franken aufgeteilt. Die Hälfte des Gründungskapitals lag bei deutschen Aktionären.
Nachdem der belgischen Eisenbahnunternehmer Simon Philippart Bankrott gegangen war und seine umfangreichen Kredite bei der Bank de Bruxelles nicht mehr bedienen konnte, geriet diese in eine finanzielle Schieflache. Daher musste sie 1877 zunächst liquidiert und dann wieder mit einem deutlich reduzierten Grundkapital von 19 Millionen Belgischer Franken unter dem alten Namen neu gegründet werden, diesmal ohne die deutschen Aktionäre, die das Vertrauen in die Bank verloren hatten. Danach blieb Geschäft der Bank de Bruxelles bis zum Ersten Weltkrieg bescheiden.
Banque Lambert's new partner had been in business since 1871. In that year, a young Venetian with the appropriately pan-European name of Jacques Errera-Oppenheim took advantage of Belgium's central location and relatively open economy by founding a large new bank in Brussels. With a group of German and Dutch financiers, he created the Banque de Bruxelles, capitalized with the unusually large sum of BFr50 million. The bank sold government bonds and lent to both private business and the government, but after a few profitable years it was caught in the slump of 1875-1876 and rapidly lost the confidence of its largely German investors. BB was forced to liquidate and reform itself as a smaller entity with the same name, after which it proceeded to grow quickly. BB was a "mixed" bank, active as both a depository for the savings of businesses and individuals and as an equity investor in the industrial sphere--since a large percentage of Belgian assets were still tied up in land, banks had to scramble for the relatively small amount of capital in circulating form.
After weathering the worldwide recession of 1890-1893, BB accelerated its investments in heavy industry, taking significant positions in the steel, coal, transportation, and electric power industries. Its total assets grew at a tremendous pace during the decades leading up to World War I--from BFr39 million in 1877 to BFr628 million just before the war. Many of these assets were tied up in foreign and colonial investments, since BB also took an active role in Belgium's imperial ambitions.
World War I required of BB a greatly increased involvement in the public sector, as it joined the other Belgian banks in trying to keep up with the payment of war indemnities and the floating of interprovincial loans. In a remarkable demonstration of the international nature of modern capital, in 1916 BB took over the Banque Internationale de Bruxelles, an institution owned by Germans, the power that then occupied Belgium. BB also helped to form the new Banque de Louvain, and in general came through the war in excellent financial condition, its assets nearly doubling to BFr1.2 billion.
In 1919, Maurice Despret became the new chairman of BB, bringing with him an ambitious plan for expansion. Despret first created a widespread network of retail branches throughout Belgium and in the Congo, gradually bringing these under the centralized administration of five geographical groups. The chairman also pursued further investments in heavy industry, setting up six new corporations that were later collected into two holding companies, Electrobel and Companie Belge pour l'industie. Finally, Despret tried to improve BB's overseas connections, working hard to organize the bank's holdings in the Congo as well as seeking new business in Europe and America. In the excellent business climate of the 1920s, these steps were extremely successful, and total assets and profits both rose rapidly despite a number of minor setbacks. At the close of the decade, BB's assets were nearly ten times what they had been at the end of the war, inspiring the confidence and over-speculation which came to an abrupt halt in October of 1929.
The Belgian economy muddled through the first few years of the Depression with some success, but by 1934 the country was nearing a general panic and the van Zeeland government was forced to take action. Since the public at large felt that banks were responsible for the Depression, van Zeeland and his finance minister, Max-Leo Gérard, set out to reform the country's antiquated banking system. One part of their reform was aimed at mixed banks like BB. To satisfy critics who suspected, quite reasonably, that companies owned by banks received undue consideration from their parents, it was declared that all banks would have to restrict themselves either to investment banking or to the deposits and loan business. On December 28, 1934, therefore, the Banque de Bruxelles' investment portfolio became Brufina, a new corporation, while its deposits-and-loan business was taken up by a newly formed Banque de Bruxelles. The companies are required by law to remain separate entitles, but over the years they have continued in close association.
Though these reforms may have helped the banking industry, they did little to solve the basic weakness of the economy, which continued unchanged until World War II erupted in 1939. As in the first war, Belgium spent years under foreign occupation, suffering the combined problems of massive deflation and German demands for equally massive war indemnity payments. BB tried to help the government make these payments, but the period up to and following liberation in 1944 was at best precarious. BB was aided during this bleak struggle by the leadership of former Finance Minister Gérard, who became the bank's chairman in 1939 and remained in that capacity until 1952. Gérard steered the bank through the difficulties of war and the equally challenging task of postwar monetary reform, when Belgium's currency was completely revamped and various other economic reforms were enacted.
Banking in Belgium had evolved into quite a different business than it had been before the reforms of 1934. These, and, to a lesser degree, reforms enacted immediately after the war, made banking into what a later chairman of BB would call "presque public"--almost a part of the public sector economy. Reacting to the chaos of the private sector during the Depression, the government decreed that all banks had to keep 65% of their deposits available for loans to the state, which was busily setting up nationalized industrial combines. This program, though stringent by American standards, was readily accepted by Gérard and BB as the Belgian economy accustomed itself to the idea of close cooperation between state and industry. As the repository of capital needed by both partners, the banks became part of a comprehensive planned economy rather than remaining independent agents. The mixed economy thus evolved seems to have worked well for all concerned, and not least the banks. To hold up its end of the bargain with government and industry, BB was forced to raise its capital sharply, from BFr200 million in 1945 to BFr700 million in 1951 and to BFr2.5 billion by 1964; profits have also increased, if not quite proportionately, at least in a continuous upward spiral.
Overseeing the postwar expansion was Louis Camu, chairman since Gérard's retirement in 1952. To take advantage of the greatly increased deposits made by a more prosperous public, Camu designed a program of expansion in both the national and overseas markets. Though prohibited by the reforms of 1934 from holding equity in other companies, BB furthered its expertise in the analysis and management of business affairs, seeking in that way to become more useful to its private borrowers. In 1953, BB introduced its first certified deposits, part of an effort to win a greater share of the retail-banking business across the country. BB has been in the vanguard of the electronic revolution in banking, offering its first automated teller machine as early as 1969 and continuing to upgrade its extensive computer facilities as a matter of course. On the international side, BB participated in the ever-expanding foreign investment and monetary exchange of the Belgian banks. In the mid-1960s, BB entered into special cooperation agreements with two of the world's largest banks, Barclays of London and Chase Manhattan in New York; and in 1971 it was asked to join the influential European banking syndicate, Société Financiére Europé-ne. In a world growing ever more complex and interdependent, BB has positioned itself to take advantage of the coming changes.
Most important, of course, was the 1975 merger with Banque Lambert. By combining the assets and experience of two of the country's leading banks, BBL strengthened its chances of surviving the gradual economic unification of Europe. With trade barriers gone, European bankers will soon be pressed by rivals from across the continent as well as by their traditional local competitors, and the battle for deposit-and-loan dollars will no doubt be prolonged and bitter. In anticipation of this struggle, Chairman Thierry has reorganized the bank according to five market segments--households, private investors, the Belgian corporate sector, multinationals, and institutional investors. In making this change, however, Thierry has emphasized that the bank is preparing not merely for the 1992 opening of the European market, important as that will be. The chairman is thinking mainly of the date, as yet unknown, yet all but certain, when all of Europe will convert to a single currency--an event which, if nothing else, will be certain to keep BBL and the rest of the European banking community more than a little busy.
Die Banque de Bruxelles (Flämisch: „Bank van Brussel“) war eine international tätige belgische Großbank mit Sitz in Brüssel.
Geschichte Bearbeiten
Die Banque de Bruxelles wurde auf Initiative des Bankiers Jacques Errera-Oppenheim (1834-1880) am 13. November 1871 in Brüssel gegründet. Das Grundkapital wurde auf 50 Millionen Belgische Franken festgesetzt und war auf 100.000 Aktien von je 500 Belgische Franken aufgeteilt. Die Hälfte des Gründungskapitals lag bei deutschen Aktionären.
Nachdem der belgischen Eisenbahnunternehmer Simon Philippart Bankrott gegangen war und seine umfangreichen Kredite bei der Bank de Bruxelles nicht mehr bedienen konnte, geriet diese in eine finanzielle Schieflache. Daher musste sie 1877 zunächst liquidiert und dann wieder mit einem deutlich reduzierten Grundkapital von 19 Millionen Belgischer Franken unter dem alten Namen neu gegründet werden, diesmal ohne die deutschen Aktionäre, die das Vertrauen in die Bank verloren hatten.
Nach dem Ende der Weltwirtschaftskrise von 1890 bis 1893, verstärkte die Banque de Bruxelles ihre Investments in der Schwerindustrie. Sie übernahm Beteiligungen im Bereich Stahl, Kohle, Eisenbahn und Elektrizitätserzeugung. Bis zu Beginn des Ersten Weltkriegs wuchs der Wert Ihrer Anlagen von 39 Million Belgischer Franken 1877 auf 628 million Belgischer Franken. Viele dieser Investments befanden sich im Ausland und in den belgischen Kolonien, da die Banque de Bruxelles aktiv Belgiens imperiale Ambitionen unterstützte.
World War I required of BB a greatly increased involvement in the public sector, as it joined the other Belgian banks in trying to keep up with the payment of war indemnities and the floating of interprovincial loans. In a remarkable demonstration of the international nature of modern capital, in 1916 BB took over the Banque Internationale de Bruxelles, an institution owned by Germans, the power that then occupied Belgium. BB also helped to form the new Banque de Louvain, and in general came through the war in excellent financial condition, its assets nearly doubling to BFr1.2 billion.
In 1919, Maurice Despret became the new chairman of BB, bringing with him an ambitious plan for expansion. Despret first created a widespread network of retail branches throughout Belgium and in the Congo, gradually bringing these under the centralized administration of five geographical groups. The chairman also pursued further investments in heavy industry, setting up six new corporations that were later collected into two holding companies, Electrobel and Companie Belge pour l'industie. Finally, Despret tried to improve BB's overseas connections, working hard to organize the bank's holdings in the Congo as well as seeking new business in Europe and America. In the excellent business climate of the 1920s, these steps were extremely successful, and total assets and profits both rose rapidly despite a number of minor setbacks. At the close of the decade, BB's assets were nearly ten times what they had been at the end of the war, inspiring the confidence and over-speculation which came to an abrupt halt in October of 1929.
The Belgian economy muddled through the first few years of the Depression with some success, but by 1934 the country was nearing a general panic and the van Zeeland government was forced to take action. Since the public at large felt that banks were responsible for the Depression, van Zeeland and his finance minister, Max-Leo Gérard, set out to reform the country's antiquated banking system. One part of their reform was aimed at mixed banks like BB. To satisfy critics who suspected, quite reasonably, that companies owned by banks received undue consideration from their parents, it was declared that all banks would have to restrict themselves either to investment banking or to the deposits and loan business. On December 28, 1934, therefore, the Banque de Bruxelles' investment portfolio became Brufina, a new corporation, while its deposits-and-loan business was taken up by a newly formed Banque de Bruxelles. The companies are required by law to remain separate entitles, but over the years they have continued in close association.
Though these reforms may have helped the banking industry, they did little to solve the basic weakness of the economy, which continued unchanged until World War II erupted in 1939. As in the first war, Belgium spent years under foreign occupation, suffering the combined problems of massive deflation and German demands for equally massive war indemnity payments. BB tried to help the government make these payments, but the period up to and following liberation in 1944 was at best precarious. BB was aided during this bleak struggle by the leadership of former Finance Minister Gérard, who became the bank's chairman in 1939 and remained in that capacity until 1952. Gérard steered the bank through the difficulties of war and the equally challenging task of postwar monetary reform, when Belgium's currency was completely revamped and various other economic reforms were enacted.
Banking in Belgium had evolved into quite a different business than it had been before the reforms of 1934. These, and, to a lesser degree, reforms enacted immediately after the war, made banking into what a later chairman of BB would call "presque public"--almost a part of the public sector economy. Reacting to the chaos of the private sector during the Depression, the government decreed that all banks had to keep 65% of their deposits available for loans to the state, which was busily setting up nationalized industrial combines. This program, though stringent by American standards, was readily accepted by Gérard and BB as the Belgian economy accustomed itself to the idea of close cooperation between state and industry. As the repository of capital needed by both partners, the banks became part of a comprehensive planned economy rather than remaining independent agents. The mixed economy thus evolved seems to have worked well for all concerned, and not least the banks. To hold up its end of the bargain with government and industry, BB was forced to raise its capital sharply, from BFr200 million in 1945 to BFr700 million in 1951 and to BFr2.5 billion by 1964; profits have also increased, if not quite proportionately, at least in a continuous upward spiral.
Overseeing the postwar expansion was Louis Camu, chairman since Gérard's retirement in 1952. To take advantage of the greatly increased deposits made by a more prosperous public, Camu designed a program of expansion in both the national and overseas markets. Though prohibited by the reforms of 1934 from holding equity in other companies, BB furthered its expertise in the analysis and management of business affairs, seeking in that way to become more useful to its private borrowers. In 1953, BB introduced its first certified deposits, part of an effort to win a greater share of the retail-banking business across the country. BB has been in the vanguard of the electronic revolution in banking, offering its first automated teller machine as early as 1969 and continuing to upgrade its extensive computer facilities as a matter of course. On the international side, BB participated in the ever-expanding foreign investment and monetary exchange of the Belgian banks. In the mid-1960s, BB entered into special cooperation agreements with two of the world's largest banks, Barclays of London and Chase Manhattan in New York; and in 1971 it was asked to join the influential European banking syndicate, Société Financiére Europé-ne. In a world growing ever more complex and interdependent, BB has positioned itself to take advantage of the coming changes.
Most important, of course, was the 1975 merger with Banque Lambert. By combining the assets and experience of two of the country's leading banks, BBL strengthened its chances of surviving the gradual economic unification of Europe. With trade barriers gone, European bankers will soon be pressed by rivals from across the continent as well as by their traditional local competitors, and the battle for deposit-and-loan dollars will no doubt be prolonged and bitter. In anticipation of this struggle, Chairman Thierry has reorganized the bank according to five market segments--households, private investors, the Belgian corporate sector, multinationals, and institutional investors. In making this change, however, Thierry has emphasized that the bank is preparing not merely for the 1992 opening of the European market, important as that will be. The chairman is thinking mainly of the date, as yet unknown, yet all but certain, when all of Europe will convert to a single currency--an event which, if nothing else, will be certain to keep BBL and the rest of the European banking community more than a little busy.
Link zur Geschichte der UBS und ihrer Vorgängerbanken: https://www.ubs.com/global/de/our-firm/our-history/roots-of-ubs.html#Cantrade%20Privatbank%20AG Link zu Schweizer Zeitungsarchiv: https://www.e-newspaperarchives.ch
| Akademische Gesellschaft Sonderbund | |||
|---|---|---|---|
| |||
| Basisdaten | |||
| Hochschulort: | Stuttgart, Deutschland | ||
| Hochschule/n: | Universität Stuttgart | ||
| Gründung: | 24. August 1859 | ||
| Farbenstatus: | Nicht farbentragend | ||
| Art des Bundes: | Männerbund | ||
| Stellung zur Mensur: | nicht schlagend | ||
| Wahlspruch: | Student sein statt nur studieren | ||
| Website: | www.sonderbund.de/sonderbund.html | ||
Die Akademische Gesellschaft Sonderbund (kurz „Sonderbund“ genannt) ist eine 1859 gegründete Studentenverbindung an der Universität Stuttgart. Sie ist eine der ältesten Studentenverbindungen in Stuttgart und gehört dem Miltenberg-Wernigeroder Ring (MWR) an.
Geschichte Bearbeiten
| Jahr | Ereignis |
|---|---|
| 1829 | Gründung der „Vereinigte Real- und Gewerbeschule“ in Stuttgart, aus der 1840 die Polytechnische Schule hervorging. |
| 1859 | Aus Unzufriedenheit mit Leitung der Polytechnischen Schule und mit etlichen Professoren gründeten am 24. August 1859 16 Studenten eine nicht fechtende und keine Farben besitzende Studentenverbindung, darunter auch zwei Schweizer und ein Finne. Auf einen Namen für diesen Zusammenschluss konnte man sich zunächst nicht einigen. |
| 1864 | Am 15. Oktober 1864 wurde die Verbindung durch 18 Studenten unter dem Namen „Sonderbund“ neu begründet. Diese Bezeichnung ging auf einem Spottnamen zurück, den andere Verbindungen dieser neuen Vereinigung geben hatten. |
| 1914–1918 | Zu Beginn des Ersten Weltkriegs meldeten sich fast alle Aktiven als Kriegsfreiwillige. |
| 1896 | Einweihung des ersten „Bundeshauses“ in der Azenbergstraße 11. Es war das erste Verbindungshaus in Stuttgart. |
| 1929 | Im Juli 1929 trat der Sonderbund dem „Schwarzer Ring“ (SR) bei, einem Dachverband der Schwarzen Verbindungen, gegründet 1922. |
| 1931 | Errichtung einer Skihütte in Oberlech (Vorarlberg, Österreich) durch skibegeisterte Mitglieder des Sonderbunds. Sie schlossen sich zur „Skizunft“, später im „Skihütte Sonderbund e.V.“ zusammen. |
| 1933 | Nach der nationalsozialistischen Machtergreifung wurden die Aktivitas des Sonderbunds schrittweise aufgelöst. Deren Reste wurden schließlich im Wintersemester 1936/1937 in den NS-Studentenbund überführt. Die Altherrenschaft des Sonderbunds, Träger des Verbindungshauses, blieb aber weiter bestehen. |
| 1939–1945 | Während des Zweiten Weltkriegs wurde das Verbindungshaus im Sommer 1944 bei einem Bombenangriff schwer beschädigt. |
| 1946 | Am 13. November 1946 gründeten 10 Studenten den Sonderbund neu, zunächst unter dem Namen „Collegium Academicum“. |
| 1948 | Am 20. November 1948 wurde die Umbenennung des Collegium Academicum in Sonderbund beschlossen. |
| 1948–1953 | Schrittweiser Wiederaufbau und Ausbau des Verbindungshauses. |
| 1960 | Herausgabe des Buchs „100 Jahre Sonderbund 1859-1959“, verfasst von Wilhelm Elben. Es ist eine Fortsetzung der Chronik „Geschichte des Sonderbundes 1859-1935“ von Walther Euting (Siehe auch unter Gliederungspunkt „Literatur“). |
| 1962 | Gründung des „Sonderbunds Allgemeine Yacht Liga“ (SAYL) als gemeinnütziger Segelverein mit Sitz in Stuttgart. Er verfügt über zwei Segelboote am Bodensee. |
| 2006 | 75-jähriges Jubiläum der Skihütte des Sonderbunds in Oberlech (Österreich). |
| 2008–2009 | Umfangreichste Renovierung des Bundeshauses seit dessen Wiederaufbau nach dem Zweiten Weltkrieg. |
Bekannte Mitglieder Bearbeiten
(Alphabetisch nach Familiennamen geordnet)
_-_2043-0566-0.jpg&action=edit&redlink=1){kind=link}
Siehe auch Bearbeiten
Literatur Bearbeiten
- Wilhelm Elben: „Geschichte des Sonderbundes an der Technischen Hochschule Stuttgart 1859-1959. Auf Wunsch des Altenvereins verfasst im Jahre 1935 von W. Euting II. Weitergeführt von W. Elben“, Stuttgart 1960;
- Thomas Maier: „Akademische Gesellschaft Sonderbund 1859-2009“, Herstellung/ Druck: Studiodruck, Stuttgart 2009.
Weblinks Bearbeiten
{{SORTIERUNG:Sonderbund}} [[Kategorie-:Studentenverbindung (Stuttgart)]] [[Kategorie-:Schwarze Verbindung]] [[Kategorie-:Gegründet 1859]]
HOW DID WE GET HERE? A DECADE OF DISTINCTIVE ACHIEVEMENT
Some key milestones in the development of EFG International:
– In 1995, we founded the business to provide private banking and asset management services to clients worldwide. Based in Zurich, we were a branch of EFG Group (then called Banque de Dépôts).
– In 1996, we established a broker-dealer operation in Miami, targeting the Latin American market.
– In 1997, we acquired The Royal Bank of Scotland AG, Zurich, first renamed EFG Private Bank SA and later EFG Bank. In the same year, EFG Bank acquired the Zurich- and Geneva-based private banking business of EFG Group.
– In 2000, we entered the Asian market, opening a representative office and broker-dealer in Hong Kong and a representative office and investment advisory office in Singapore. Both operations were upgraded to bank branches in 2002 (Hong Kong) and in 2003 (Singapore).
15
16
– We have since expanded into the Americas and other parts of Europe through organic growth as well as a series of carefully selected acquisitions. Notable among these was the purchase of IBP Fondkommission (2001); Banque Edouard Constant in Geneva (2003); BanSabadell Finance (2003); and Banco Atlántico Gibraltar Ltd. (2004). – We have added new businesses, such as an operation providing structured notes, in order to expand our capabilities and capacity to provide the broadest possible range of investment products and services. As described in the chairman’s letter, 2005 was a year of continued activity: we continued to hire highly qualified CROs, we acquired six private banking businesses, we expanded geographically and we continued to build the organisational infrastructure to support our business growth. We have continued to make progress in 2006 with the acquisition of Capital Management Advisors Ltd. in Bermuda and with the opening of banks in Dubai, the Bahamas and Luxembourg and a trust administration office in Hong Kong.