Copy.
383
:
8814
12071/20
The Custodian of Enemy Property,
1. The correspondence is not clear. In December, 6889 1919, the Colonial Office proposed to the Board of Trade that the Tongkong and Shanghai Bank shares should be registered in the name of the local Custodian, meaning apparently the Hongkong Custodian. On the 5th March, 1920, the Board of Trade concurred in this proposal. In spite of this concur- rence it would appear that the Public Trustee in London pro- ceeded to have the shares registered in his name, and nothing is said about his retiring from that position. I refer now to the shares registered under the Order-in-Council; other shares were vested by order of the Board of Trade or of the High Court, apparently before the coming into operation of the. Treaty of Peace Order.
2. If the Public Trustee can sell the shares, it would be much better that he should do so, because he is already on the register, and I understand that the market here
for shares on the London register is a smell one, and that the demand falls with the exchange. It may be that the Public Trustee is doubtful of his legal powers to deal with shares in
a Hongkong corporation, but no such doubt has been expressed
from England.
I think that we should write again to the Secre-
tery of State in the following sense:-
(a).
It would be much more convenient for the Public
Trustee to sell the shares, if he can do so, as
he is on the register, and as the market is
chiefly in London.
(b). This proposal is strengthened by the fact that
the bank here have refused to register the Hong Kong Custodian on the Hongkong register, and
thev might object to register him now in London on the London register.