Soviet joint-stock company

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Sowjetische Aktiengesellschaft ( SAG ) was the name for commercial enterprises in the Soviet Zone / GDR that were founded and managed by the Soviet occupying power (SMAD). The main purpose of the Soviet joint-stock companies was to cover claims by the Soviet Union for German reparations after the Second World War .

history

SAG-Sachsenwerke Niedersedlitz, 1953

The SAG companies included around 200 larger industrial companies in Soviet ownership in the Soviet Zone / GDR with a total of 300,000 employees, which were at times organized in up to 35 joint-stock companies. The large companies, which were expropriated in 1945 and originally intended for dismantling , were converted into Soviet joint-stock companies under German stock corporation law on the basis of order No. 167 of the SMAD of June 5, 1946 ( on the transfer of companies in Germany to the property of the USSR due to reparation claims ) founded. This marked a turning point in the reparations policy of the USSR, as one now switched to the withdrawal of reparations from current production. Some of the SAG operations were rebuilt. This included the largest part of shipbuilding on the Baltic coast and parts of heavy engineering. The main administration of Soviet assets abroad in the Council of Ministers of the USSR was wholly owned . The operations were under the administration for affairs of the Soviet State Stock Corporation in Germany of the SMAD. The share of industrial production in 1947 was 20%. The companies could be acquired in stages through repurchase by the states of the Soviet occupation zone and the GDR and transferred to public ownership. After the popular uprising of June 17, 1953 , reparation payments were discontinued with effect from January 1, 1954 and the last 33 Soviet companies were transferred to the GDR's property.

Wismut AG represented a special feature, which was of outstanding importance for the Soviet nuclear weapons program . This reparations operation was not a SAG as described above. Wismut was founded in Moscow by resolution of the Council of Ministers of the USSR on May 10, 1947 . The main shareholders of Wismut AG with 70% of the shares were the main administration of Soviet assets abroad, which was subordinate to the Ministry of Foreign Trade of the USSR, and the State Stock Corporation for Non-ferrous Metals , which was subordinate to the Ministry of Non-ferrous Metallurgy, with 30% of the shares. On June 4, 1947, the general meeting of shareholders passed the resolution to found a subsidiary in Germany. This was entered in the commercial register in Aue on July 2, 1947 . The Bismut was directly under Soviet administration. On November 28, 1953, by resolution of the shareholders in Moscow, Wismut AG was liquidated and on December 21, 1953 the Soviet-German Corporation (SDAG) Wismut was founded at a shareholders' meeting in Karl-Marx-Stadt . It took over all assets of Wismut AG , but without becoming its legal successor.

In occupied post-war Austria, the USSR managed around 300 companies until 1955 under a holding company called USIA .

Remarks

  1. ↑ The number fluctuates between 196 companies documented in the GDR literature and 213 companies.

Individual evidence

  1. ^ Christiane Künzel: Administration of Soviet [state] stock corporations in Germany (SAG) . In: Horst Möller , Alexandr O. Tschubarjan (ed.): SMAD-Handbuch: The Soviet Military Administration in Germany 1945–1949. Oldenbourg-Verlag, Munich 2009, ISBN 978-3-486-58696-1 , p. 391.

literature

  • Martin Broszat , Hermann Weber, Gerhard Braas (eds.): SBZ manual: State administrations, parties, social organizations and their executives in the Soviet occupation zone of Germany 1945–1949. Oldenbourg-Verlag, 1993, ISBN 3-486-55262-7 .
  • Wolfgang Mühlfriedel: SAG companies - schools of socialism. A sketch of the historical development of Soviet state ownership of industrial means of production in the Soviet zone of occupation and in the German Democratic Republic. In: Yearbook for Economic History. 1980/4, Akademie-Verlag, Berlin 1980, pp. 159–186 ( digitized version of the entire yearbook ).
  • Jörg Roesler: Soviet stock corporations (SAG). In: Wolfgang Benz (Ed.): Germany under Allied occupation 1945–1949 / 55. A manual. Akademie-Verlag, Berlin 1999, ISBN 3-05-003148-4 , p. 300/301.
  • Christiane Künzel: Administration of Soviet [State] Public Companies in Germany (SAG). In: Horst Möller , Alexandr O. Tschubarjan (ed.): SMAD-Handbuch: The Soviet Military Administration in Germany 1945–1949. Oldenbourg-Verlag, Munich 2009, ISBN 978-3-486-58696-1 , pp. 388-395.

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