The downward movement of the Crédit Mobilier, as we 
anticipated some months ago, when examining its flowery Report 
for 1856,* has again set in, this time filling the monetary mind of 
Europe with considerable alarm. In the course of a few days the 
shares of the concern declined from 950 francs to about 850, this 
latter quotation being far from the lowest point to which they are 
likely to ebb. The rise and subsidence of the primeval waters 
affords no subject of greater interest to the geologist than the 
ascent and declension of the Crédit Mobilier shares to the 
politician. There are different epochs to be distinguished in the 
oscillations of the latter. Their first issue in 1852 was cleverly 
managed. The shares were divided into three series, the holders of 
the first series being entitled to the second and third series at par. 
The consequence was that the fortunate possessors of the first 
series had all the advantage of a limited supply of shares in a 
highly excited market, and also of the exaggerated anticipations of 
the large premium to be quickly attained by the stock of the 
society. With 250 francs paid on the first issue, the market price of 
the shares rose at once to 1,775 francs. Their oscillations during 
the years 1852, ’53 and ’54 are of minor political interest, since 
they indicate the different phases through which the forming 
enterprise had to run rather than the trials of the full-grown 
concern. In 1855 the Crédit Mobilier had reached its apogee, the 
momentary quotation at 1,900 francs of its shares marking its 
greater distance from common earthly business. Since that time 
the oscillations in the prices of the Crédit Mobilier shares, if 

closely considered, and if the average of periods, say of 4 months, 
be taken, exhibit a downward movement, regulated, in spite of 
accidental deviations, by a constant and unerring law. The law is 
this, that from the highest point reached in each of those periods 
the prices subside to a lowest average point, which, in its turn, 
becomes the highest starting point for the subsequent period. 
Thus the figures of 1,400 francs, 1,300 francs, 1,100 francs, mark 
successively the lowest average point of one period and the highest 
average point of the other. During the whole of the present 
Summer, the shares were unable to reach, for any more 
protracted time, the hight of 1,000 francs; and the present crisis, 
if it does not result in worse consequences, will bring down the 
highest average price of the shares to about 800 francs, thence to 
sink down, in due course of time, to a still lower average level. 
This process can, of course, not go on ad infinitum, nor 1s it 
compatible with the organic laws of the Crédit Mobilier that its 
stocks should be reduced to their nominal quotation of 500 francs. 
An immense disproportion between capital and operations, hence 
the realization of extraordinary profits, and, consequently, an 
unusual elevation of the market price of its shares over their 
original amount, are conditions for the Crédit Mobilier not of 
prosperity, but of life. We need the less dwell on this point, as we 
have sufficiently elucidated it when examining the reduction of its 
profits from 40 per cent in 1855 to 23 per cent in 1856. 

The present depreciation of the Crédit Mobilier shares is 
connected with circumstances likely to be mistaken for causes, 
although they are only effects. Mr. A. Thurneyssen, one of the 
most “respectable” directors of the Crédit Mobilier, has been 
declared a bankrupt in consequence of the law tribunals pro- 
nouncing him liable for a debt of 15,000,000 francs, contracted by 
his nephew, Mr. Charles Thurneyssen, who fraudulently de- 
camped from France in May last. That the mere bankruptcy of an 
individual director cannot at all account for the present state of 
the Crédit Mobilier, will be understood at once by referring to the 
bankruptcy of Mr. Place, which passed away without shaking to 
any sensible degree the Bonapartist bulwark. The public mind, 
however, is more apt to be struck by the sudden downfall of an 
individual than to trace the slow decline of an institution. Panic 
seizes the masses only when danger assumes a gross and palpable 
form. For instance, Law’s shares and bank notes went on enjoying 

the superstitious confidence of France as long as the Regent* and 
his counselors contented themselves with depreciating the metallic 
money which the notes pretended to represent. The public did not 
understand that when the mint coined the mark? of silver in 
double the original number of livres, the bank note representing a 
given amount of silver livres was depreciated one half. But the 
very moment the notes themselves became, by order of council, 
depreciated in their official denomination, and a note of 100 livres 
was to be exchanged for a note of 50 livres, the process was at 
once understood, and the bubble burst. Thus the fall of almost 50 
per cent in the profits of the Crédit Mobilier did not for a 
moment attract the attention even of the English money-article 
writers, while the whole press of Europe is now full of din and 
bustle about Mr. A. Thurneyssen’s bankruptcy. The latter, in fact, 
is accompanied by aggravating circumstances. When Mr. Charles 
Thurneyssen defaulted in May last Mr. Isaac Pereire, with more 
than his usual display of virtuous indignation, started forward in 
the London press to solemnly deny all connection on the part of 
Mr. A. Thurneyssen and the Crédit Mobilier with the wretched 
defaulter.© The present decision of the French law tribunals has, 
therefore, given a flat contradiction to that high-sounding 
gentleman. 

Moreover, panic seems to reign in the Crédit Mobilier itself. 
Mr. Ernest Andrée, one of the Directors, has thought fit to publicly 
free himself from all future liability, and to renounce all 
connection with the institution by legal methods. Others—among 
them the house of Hottinguer—are also said to be beating the 
retreat. When the pilots themselves take to the life-boat, the 
passengers may justly consider the vessel lost. Lastly, the intimate 
connection of the Thurneyssens with the St. Petersburg banking- 
house of Stieglitz and the great Russian railway scheme may well 
afford food for thought to the European monetary mind. 

If the Directors of the Crédit Mobilier condescend to “create 
credit in France,” to “foster the productive powers of the nation,” 
and to prop up stock gambling all over the world, it would be a 
stupendous mistake to suppose that they did so for nothing. Over 
and above the average interest of about 25 per cent annum on the 
capital represented by their shares, they regularly received a bonus 

“Paris, May 25”, The Times, No. 22692, May 28, 1857.— Ed. 

of 5 per cent on the gross profits, say the sum of 275,000 francs 
or $55,000 each for the first five years of the institution. Then, 
those Railway Companies and other public works which especially 
enjoyed the patronage of the Crédit Mobilier, are invariably found 
to be somehow or other mixed up with the private affairs of the 
Directors. Thus the Pereires were known to be largely interested 
in the new shares of the French Southern Railways. Now, in 
perusing the published accounts, we find the Company in its 
aggregate capacity to have subscribed not less than 623,000,000 
francs to these identical railways. But not only did the fifteen 
Directors use to direct the operations of the Company according 
to their private interests; they were also able to regulate their 
private speculations, in conformity with the foreknowledge they 
possessed of the great coups de bourse* the Company was about to 
execute; and, finally, to enlarge their own credit in proportion to 
the immense sums officially passing through their hands. Hence 
the miraculously rapid enrichment of these Directors; hence the 
nervous anxiety of the European public in regard to financial 
reverses occurring among them; hence, too, the intimate connec- 
tion between their private fortunes and the public credit of the 
Company, although some of the former are sure to be so managed 
as to outlive the latter. 

Written on September 8, 1857 Reproduced from the newspaper 
Tribune, No. 5128, September 26, 1857