Fiduciary management for the German-Dutch financial agreement

from Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

The trusteeship for the German-Dutch financial agreement GmbH (Tredefina) was one in 1920 by the government of the Weimar Republic formed public institution to manage one of the Government of the Netherlands to the German Reich granted revolving credit facility of 140 million Dutch guilders .

history

Foundation and work

After the end of the First World War , the German economy was faced, among other things, with a considerable shortage of foreign currency , which hindered the urgently needed import of food and industrial raw materials . Since Dutch banks intensified their relations with Germany again after the end of the war , Matthias Erzberger , who was appointed Reich Minister of Finance on June 21, 1919, left the banker and CEO of the Nederlandsche Handel-Maatschappij , Cornelis Johannes Karel van Aalst, ready explore the Dutch banks to grant a loan of 500 million guilders to the German Reich. After long negotiations, led on the German side by Alexander Kreuter , Commissioner for Raw Materials and Manufactures of the “Dictatorial Economic Committee”, the State Treaty on the German-Dutch financial agreement was signed on May 11, 1920 . According to this agreement , Dutch banks granted the German Reich a one-time instant loan of 60 million guilders for the import of food from the Netherlands and the Dutch East Indies, as well as 140 million guilders as a revolving loan to finance raw material imports for German industry. The interest rate was 6 percent.

As a result, the trust administration for the German-Dutch financial agreement GmbH was founded with a share capital of 200,000 marks (50% of which was paid in) to manage the loan , with Kreuter as director. The agreement came into force towards the end of 1920 and was subsequently extended several times. The Tredefina issued, against appropriate credit security by transferring ownership of goods or pledging capital goods such as B. ships , guilder loans and monitored their settlement. The loans usually ran for a year, with the possibility of extension , and were to be repaid in actual guilders. The borrowers were obliged to always mark stocks of goods transferred to secure the credit and the rooms or places where they were kept with the designation “DNF”. The loan was repaid in the first years of the Second World War after the occupation of France.

Second World War and misuse

During the Second World War, the remaining funds of Tredefina von Kreuter, meanwhile a member of the General SS and in the service of the foreign intelligence service headed by Walter Schellenberg in Amt VI of the Reich Main Security Office (RSHA) of the SS, were used to fund the "Aryanized" French investment bank "Société Financière pour l 'Étranger ”(SFE), renaming it“ Société de Crédits et d'Investissements ”(SCI) and using it with funds from Tredefina to buy“ Aryanized ”shares in French companies, including the“ Société des Schistes Bitumineux d'Autun ” ", Which exploited the oil shale at Autun , and the department store chain" Galeries Lafayette ".

post war period

After the Second World War, the loan was renewed by a Dutch banking consortium on a private basis and on the basis of a special license with an initial 25 million guilders, soon afterwards it was increased to 50 million guilders and in the early 1960s to 200 million guilders. The new loan could partially be used for imports from the dollar area, with a term of six months, while guilder loans had a term of twelve months. After the currency reform of 1948, the registered capital of the trust administration was converted to DM 200,000. Tredefina, now with branches in Düsseldorf and Munich, existed until the early 1970s.

Footnotes

  1. ↑ Christoph Kreutzmüller: Dealers and sales assistants: The Amsterdam financial center and the major German banks (1918–1945) . Franz Steiner, Stuttgart 2005, ISBN 3-515-08639-0 , p. 39.
  2. ↑ Christoph Kreutzmüller: Dealers and sales assistants: The Amsterdam financial center and the major German banks (1918–1945) . Franz Steiner, Stuttgart 2005, ISBN 3-515-08639-0 , p. 39.
  3. ↑ The Hansa line z. B. pledged their Lauterfels on November 2, 1923 ( ddghansa-shipsphotos.de ) and on November 6, 1923 at least four more of their freighters used in East India traffic to the Tredefina: the Bärenfels ( historisches-marinearchiv.de ), the Drachenfels ( ddghansa-shipsphotos.de ), the Frauenfels ( ddghansa-shipsphotos.de ) and the Goldenfels ( ddghansa-shipsphotos.de ).
  4. ↑ The DG "Neptune" took advantage of the opportunity to gain against the pledge of ships loans. On November 16, 1923, she pledged the Kümos Astarte from 1920 ( seefahrtsfreunde-emden.de ), the Castor from 1896 ( historisches-marinearchiv.de ), the Pallas from 1904 and the Pylades from 1906 to Tredefina.
  5. ↑ Gerhard Müller, Josef Löffelholz: Bank-Lexikon: Concise dictionary for the banking and savings bank system. 1st edition. Gabler, Wiesbaden 1953, ISBN 978-3-663-12768-0 , p. 775.
  6. ↑ Gerhard Müller, Josef Löffelholz: Bank-Lexikon: Concise dictionary for the banking and savings bank system. 5th edition. Springer Fachmedien, Wiesbaden 1963, ISBN 978-3-663-12765-9 , p. 1415.
  7. ↑ F. Calvi, M.-J. Masurovsky: Le Festin du Reich. Le pillage de la France occupée. Fayard, Paris 2006, pp. 390-394.
  8. ^ John Gillingham: On the prehistory of the Montan Union: Western Europe's coal and steel in the depression and war. In: Vierteljahrshefte für Zeitgeschichte. Volume 34, Issue 3, Institute for Contemporary History, Munich / Berlin 1986, pp. 399–400.
  9. ↑ Gerhard Müller, Josef Löffelholz: Bank-Lexikon: Concise dictionary for the banking and savings bank system. 5th edition. Springer Fachmedien, Wiesbaden 1963, ISBN 978-3-663-12765-9 , p. 1415.
  10. ↑ Gerhard Müller, Josef Löffelholz: Bank-Lexikon: Concise dictionary for the banking and savings bank system. 1st edition. Gabler, Wiesbaden 1953, ISBN 978-3-663-12768-0 , p. 775.

literature

  • Martijn Lak: Tot elkaar veroordeeld: de Nederlands-Duitse economische betrekkingen tussen 1945–1957. Uitgeverij Verloren, Hilversum 2015, ISBN 978-90-8704-547-0 , pp. 139–143: Een Nederlands krediet voor Duitsland?