| Show S A Kean Co Chicago Bankers t Suspend CHICAGO Dee l7The private banking house of S A Kean Co one of the oldest ia Chicago will not open its doors tomorrow tomor-row > sMr Kean made a statement t tho press to night announcing the suspension He declined declned toesti mate the liabilities or assets but was of the opinion that every claim would be paid in fulL They had been negotiating ne-gotiating some time he said for a reorganization reorgan-ization either as a state or national bank ana expected to reorganize without stopping stop-ping business but had found however how-ever it would be impossible in a short time t raise the necessary funds to continue the business with safety pending a reorganization reorganiza-tion I was thereupon determined t accept ac-cept the next wisest course a suspension Our business continued Kean had grown too rapidly the last year or two for our capital and the stringency in the money market made it impossible to turn over security se-curity again at once after we had loaned mone them Our nominal money on capital was 100030 but in the reorganization it would L be half a million The firm which was formerly known frm formery as i Preston Kean Co has done a large business bus-iness in floating city county and public improvement im-provement bonds issued in the west These when not otherwise disposed of would be pledged to banks for call Jones at New York and other eastern points These l4 j a loans recently have been called heavily and the drain on the house apparently reached the limit today Another factor was the circumstance that the demand for securities of comparatively newlysettled districts such as were largely dealt in by Kean Co had been off to a considerable extent Deposits in the institution aggregated aggre-gated between 000000 and 700000 iOOOOO Wide celebrity was given the house some vears ago by the extraordinary interests inter-ests following the defalcation its cashier Kerr who was traced to and brought back from Peru and after a long legal tight incarcerated in-carcerated in Joliet A number of Chicago bankers had a meeting tonight after Kean decided to close his doors and discussed the local financial situation No alarm was felt as I the banks had been getting ready for any danger of this kind and public confidence was being restored in the financial institutions institu-tions of the country A temporary flurry it was thought might be created in local speculative circles but no severe result would follow The gentlemen present spoke confidently of Chicagos banks pulling throngh without embarrassment |
