Bisbee daily review., 1908-10-30
United States Inrestor.l


 CTS of the United States Express Com | pany, which must be galling indeed, is really amusing from the standpoint of the disinterested outsider and at the same time it is an amazing com mentary on the possibilities of incor- poration papers and the careful man ipulation of our express financiers.
 Think of this situation.
 The United States Express com pany has approximately S20,00O,0OO or assets, and the company has had no annual meeting for forty-five years. The holders of about 60 per cent or all outstanding stock almost two years ago joined forces, and ever since that time have been endeavor- ing to have a meeting held without success. The only thing they have accomplished was to secure the pay ment last year of an extra dividend of one per cent, making their return for that year per cent instead of per cent. Now the company comes Iout with its annual report for the past year and says that on receipts from transportation of almost $l7 ,OoO,- OoG, a net profit of only $3I,734 was realized. or less than quarter of one per cent Consider this statement for A moment. If you paid S4.000 for
 having a box shipped across the coup- try by express the poor unpaid 'eX- press company would only realize profit of one cent on the transaction. The company has. however, some $7'' 300. 900 of investments in stocks, bonds, real estate and mortgages on which they display signal ability in being able to cut off the coupons, cash the dividend checks and receive the rents, so from this source $469,- 93O was realized, making a total net
 profit for distribution for the year ot
 $507, ,664. The dividend paid amount ed to $400, 900, and management eX penses used up the balance.
 The Adams and American Express companies. it's rich and powerful ri vals. own 20 per cent of the stock keep Tom Platt and his sons ir charge for them, paying the Platt fam lily some s50,000 a year in salaries | for the job, and whenever occasion
 requires or their disposition iRclines they take a railroad contract away
 from the company and appropriate i
  Ition. The American company, after paying an extra dividend of 20O pel cent. maintain an annual dividend rate of 12 per cent. The Adams com lpany does almost as well, and thu lWells-Fargo company earns about o' per cent a year, so it would seen
 strange that the United States com pany could only realize a profit of
 quarter of one per cent on its trans portation business, when all the othe Icompanies can do so much better But is it strange when the fact i borne in mind that the United State |. company is controlled by it's rivals The ludicrous part of it is that tn rival companies only own 20 per cen of the stock or a matter of $2,OOO,OO( Tt is believed that their friends owl . possibly $500,O0O more, so that at tn outside they actually control yotin
 power on only 9 per cent of tn
 stock. That the holders of the othe l75 per cent of the stock are yer , weary goes without saying, and thei | efforts to extricate themselves fro1 l. Ithe meshes of this web of expres - high finance makes a very interestin V story.
 d Incidentally investors should t i careful when they buy shares in Q joint stock association as distinguis B. ed from a stock corporation, and tht d should invariably carefully examir r the articles of the association befol l. they go in. Iii a joint stock associ f ton it seems to be possible to so pr IT arrange things that the people hol 2 ling small minority of stock can pra ii ticaly perpetuate themselves in L "a management. A stock corporation ,e oftentimes bad enough but the c Id press company brand of joint sto e. associations has all corporation tric D-l discounted. They have exercised a sd demand all the benefits of laws d corporations but when it comes
 the obligations of the same laws tn 95 they say that they are notSa corp En ation.
 20 Poor old Tom Platt may be in 20 senility, but he nominally, in a oo event. handles his United Exprt e go stockholders with an iron jabbing a oo which well justifies the holders of oo per cent of the stock who actua O. control the company in paying ! oo and his son very handsomely for oo work
 sS The statement that the comps 5o earned last year on transportat