168
$619,89 be carried forward to the new account, Captain CLARKE-I bave much pleasure in seconding the amendment.
The CHAIRMAN-Do I understand you right, Mr. Arnold. That you propose this amendment because $20,00 set aside last half year for electric lifts now appears on the other side of the account?
Mr. ARNOLD No; I take it that what you set aside last year is really so much written off the electric plant.
The CHAIRMAN-820,000 was set aside for the electric lifts.
Mr. ARNOLD Aud repairs and renewals ? The CHAIRMAN $30 has been set aside against this account. $1000 for ordinary wear and tear was provided for, for the half year. Our experience has shown that this amount for the balf year is nothing too much, $20,000 was set aside to pay for electric lifts because we found hydraulio lifts inadequate and too slow when the house is full. These lifts have not yet been paid for.
Mr. ARNOLD. Have they been received ? The CHAIRMAN-No; not even ordered yet. Mr. ARNOLD The money has been set aside to pay for them. Why set aside more now?
The CHAIRMAN-The money has been set aside for repairs and renewals. We will have another expenditure in connection with the electric lifts, and the money set aside for them I take it that you wish now to be divided as a dividend?
Mr. ARNOLD Not that; only the amount taken cut of the profits of this last half year. I am not dealing with the previous half at all.
The CHAIRMAN-For the current half year the directors' proposal is to write off; say, $10,000, which they have found from many years of experience is none too much. We propose to write off $10,000 for repairs and renewals. proposal is to reduce that amount to $4,000, thereby starving that account to the extent of $6,000.
Your
Mr. ARNOLD-There is already 86.000 standing to the credit of repairs and renewals account.
The CHAIRMAN- That is set aside until the electric lifts are paid for.
Captain CLARKE Let the electric lifts be written off gradually, so that they will be ex- tinguished by the time they are worn out.
The CHAIRMAN-If you will permit me, I will repeat some remarks I made on the 28th August, 1900, on this subject, in connection with an increased dividend which was then proposed as an amendment to the directors' recommenda- tion-"In the first place, I do not consider the earnings justify a higher dividend, becauso the appropriation of profits as suggested by the report, urged, if it urged at all, in not writing off enough from furniture and fixtures. Since 1895 we have spent in this direction $134,855. and during the same period have written off 885,049; this, in my opinion, is, if anything, inadequate, because a large proportion of the expenditure was upon carpets, cutlery, crockery glassware and linen, on which the wear and tear is so great that I think it would be more correct to pay for such articles out of earnings, and take no credit in the account for their existence. The outlay on furniture and fix- tures will always constitute a very large item in our expenditure, and necessarily so, because if you starve the business of its legitimate nourish- ment in the shape of up-to-date furnishing, you will be starving the goose that lays the golden eggs. A well-appointed comfortable hotel will thrive, but a mean, badly-appointed one, such as we were a few years ago, will repel custom rather than altract it." I commend these remarks to your earnest consideration to-day. If this hotel is to keep up to the standard which we have endeavoured to keep up to in the past we must spend largely and lavishly. We have rivals cropping up. There will be probably more in the future, and it behores us as directors to advise you to be content with a moderate divid- end, and keep the place up to a certain standard of comfort so that whatever opposition comes along we can always hold our own. If no other gentleman has any remarks to make I will put the amendment.
Mr. PARFITT—I would like to say, in reply to Mr. Arnold, that the electric lifts will be an asset, and will only replace the old ones.
Mr. ARNOLD-I presume the old ones were written off long ago?
THE HONGKONG WEEKLY PRESS AND
Mr. PARFITT-When we get the new ones they will be an asset worth $20,000. You say the old ones are written off, but I cannot agree with you.
Mr. ARNOLD-If so much is set aside for repairs and renewals each year, I should think that they were. Do you mean to say that the lifts stand at their original cost?
Mr. PARFITT I don't say what they stand at. Mr. ARNOLD-Are lifts included in the furniture account ?
Mr. PARFITT In the furniture and fixtures, I think.
Mr. ARNOLD-In previous years we have written large sums off for furniture and fixtures. Mr. PARFITT I am not pre¡ ared to say that I was quite correct in my last remark.
Mr. ARNOLD-I could understand if there is to be a permanent diminution we must put up with a reduced dividend. I think we are in rather a hurry to reduce the dividend; we should wait and see what the next half year brings forth. The total earnings of 1905, I understand, equal the total earnings of 1904.
Mr. CRUICKSHANK-Last year $172,000 was earned, and in the previous year $184,000, yet you propose to set aside a larger sum for repairs and renewals last year than in the previous year. It seems rather an unequal division. Naturally, the directors have some valid reason for writing off so much in one year. It occurs to me it would be better to maintain the regularity of
our dividend.
Mr. Ports-I would like to know how the bar is paying now on the receipts so far?
The CHAIRMAN-The reoripts for January and February show about the same falling off per month as they have done for the six months of last year
The CHAIRMAN-It has been proposed as an amendment by Mr. Arnold, and seconded by Captain Clarke, that the amount, standing at credit of profit and loss account shall be distributed thus :- Pay a dividend of 10 per transfer to repairs and renewals account, $4,000; cent. for the half year, absorbing $60,00;
write off from value of electric plant-$629.51; carry forward to new account, $619.89-total $65 249.40.
eleven for and three directors against,
On the amendment being put there were
The CHAIRMAN-The amendment is carried, gentlemen. The next business is the
re-election of Mr. W. H. Potts as a director.
Captain GODDARD-I have much pleasure to the Board of Directors. in proposing that Mr. Potts be re-elected
Captain CLARKE-I have much pleasure in seconding.
The motion was carried. Mr. Lo HASKELL
CHAU-SHUI moved, and Mr. seconded, that Messrs. H. U. Jeffries and A. R. Lowe be re-appointed
auditors. Carried.
The CHAIRMAN-Dividend warrants will be
ready on Tuesday, gentlemen; they have not yet been written out, as we expected something
of this sort,
Thank you for your attendauce. Mr. CRUICKSHANK Before separating I chairman and directors for the conscientious should like to put on record cur thanks to the
way in which they have looked after interests during the past six mouths, although we have had to differ with them on the small point about a dividend.
our
Captain GODDARD seconded the motion. shank; your remarks are appreciated.
The CHAIRMAN-Thank you, Mr. Cruick.
THE SHANGHAI LAND INVEST-
MENT COMPANY, LTD.
|
risks on
[March 5, 1906, of some Tla. 35,000 for roads, bridges, bundings' etc., and have spent Tls. 150,000 on new buildings. All this development is promising very well indeed and cannot fail to add materially to our permanent earning power. The gross rentals show the satisfactory increase of Tis. 28,500; but, on the other hand, our working expenses have been much heavier. With a view to keeping our properties in really good order, and in consequence, a'so, of some changes of tenancy involving redecorating, etc., beyond what is usual, there has been some excess in what may bo considered ordinary up-keep. But beyond. this we have had to meet the following items:- About Tls. 4,000 in consequence of the typhoon in September; Tls, 5,500, repairs of a permanent character which should relieve us from outlay in this respect for some years to come; Tls. 4 100, increase in taxation; Tis. 2,000, insurance against fire, aud of rentals-a new departure, but one that will be appreciated as giving us a definite security of our income; and over Tls. 6,000 from increased rates of fire insurance, making a total of Tis. 21,600. I should like to say a word as to these increased rates of fire insurance. I understand that they are considered necessary owing to the heavy losses sustained through fires in Chinese houses too often, it is suspected, caused by incendiarism. It is notorious enough that it is the insurance of contents in their houses that leads to this, and it would appear that the keen competition for this class of business tends to some indifference as to the selection of risks. The ineritable we find in the frequent fices that occur; and because of the hazardous nature of those contents," the houses themselves are charged with enormous premia. The aystem seems entirely inevitable, and it is surely time that the saddle should be put on the right horse "that the reckless insuring of "con- tents should be discontinued, and that the owners of "contents" should be made to bear the burden that belongs to them, while house-owners rate on their buildings. To return to the ac- should be charged a reasonable and legitimate
counts the working accounts shows an increase in "Charges a count," mainly due to passages of the staff. On the other hand, salaries and directors' fees are almost correspondingly less. As to Profit and Loss account there is nothing to say, beyond that the appropriations sanctioned at the last meeting have been made. Reserve Fund, as you know, is built up from the interest acorned from undeveloped estates and stands at the substantial sum of Tis. 828,813,05; and the Special Reserve Fund, intended for the equalisation of dividends, has Tls. 170,000 to credit for use if occasion should arise. Referring to the balance sheet, you will find some changes in and additions to the various estates, which have been fully dealt with in the Report, but in reference to No. 16, ou Ferry Road, I should say that we into small lots for sale, believing that we are, in are dividing up this newly-acquired property this way, offering a convenience to some of our shareholders and others who may desire small holdings, facilities for mortgage and building pany if desired. The amount of our mortgages, on such properties being afforded by the Com.
Tls. 1,668, 00, is rather less than last year. They are all profitable and are well covered. As to the current year, I may say that with an increased rental account and, I hope, a roduod proportion of working expenses, our accounts for 1906 should show improving results.
MISSIONARIES MURDERED IN
KIANGSI.
The
SHANGHAI, February 26th. A purely local outbreak has occurred at Nan- ohangfu in Kianesi Province.
the priest for a large indemnity the magistrate killed by the French priests. either committed suicide or was attacked and
this Company was hold on Feb. 22nd. The The seventeenth annual general meeting of usual resolutions were all passed, after the invited the local Chinese magistrate to a ban. It is reported that some French priests Chairman, Mr. E. Jeuner Hogg, had said-Woquet, where refusing to agree to the demands of keep up our ordinary dividend and carry for- ward a substantial sam, but haring madɔ no sales of property during the year, we cannot yet offer you another bonus. When last I addressed you I told you that we contemplated developments, and these we are carrying out. It has, in fact, been a year of preparation, of which the fruits may be safely expected to commenco this year and to increase in those immediately following. We have added to our land by purchases to the extent of about 240,000 taels. We have improved our estates at a cost
A mob promptly assembled and killed aix Roman Catholic priests, burnt all the mission premises except the buildings of the China Inland Mission.
The Rev. Mr. Kingham, of the Plymouth Brethren Mission, with his wife and two children were also murdered.
Fourteen Ameriosa missionaries escaped by boat.
1 ","Page 21