August i, 1907.] 



THE INDIA RUBBER WORLD 



339 



Progress of Rubber Planting. 



THE LONDON RUBBER SHARE MARKET. 



WITH serious depreciations in share values reported in 

 practically every section of the Stock Exchange, it is a 

 matter for congratulation, says the London Financier, 

 that the rubber share market has escaped participation in what, 

 without exaggeration, can be termed the universal slump in prices. 

 In many cases it is true that plantation share quotations are not so 

 good as they were some time ago; on the other hand, the prices 

 of the leading shares are higher, and the market in them more 

 active and steadier than was the case at the beginning of the 

 year. There has been some fairly heavy selling of these shares, 

 and these orders, almost without exception, says the Financier, 

 came from investment or semi speculative holders who, having 

 been "hard hit" by the slump in railway shares and the like 

 have been obliged to dispose of their sound marketable securities, 

 and this forced selling has embraced rubber shares. Generally, 

 says the Financier, the rubber shares when they pass from the 

 hands of the original or early holders are taken by investors who 

 mean to stick to them like glue, and the recent forced selling 

 gave the purchasers opportunities for acquiring shares which, had 

 Stock E.xchange conditions been more favorable, would never 

 have come upon the market at all. 



MEXICAN PLANTING INTEREST. 



Meyer Newmark. owner of "El Retire" plantation, a privately 

 owned property at Santa Rosa, state of Vera Cruz, Mexico, near 

 Mr. James C. Harvey's "Buena Ventura" estate and several com- 

 pany owned rubber plantations, is reported by the Mexican 

 Herald as planning to begin tapping this year his eight year old 

 rubber trees, of which he has about 10,000. The Mexican Mutual 

 Planters' Co. are also mentioned as about to begin tapping, and 

 also the Societe Anonyme Santa Rosa [sec The Indi.^ Rubber 

 World, June i, 1907 — page 272]. 



The escrow created by the trust deed of July 8, 1898, between 

 the Mexican Mutual Planters' Co. and The Equitable Trust Co., 

 of Chicago, as trustee, under which the latter held 1000 of the 

 plantation bonds provided for by said deeds, has been terminated, 

 and the bonds delivered to the Mexican Mutual Planters' Co. 



The Castilloa Rubber Plantation Co., incorporated under the 

 laws of Oregon, November 16, 1906, has secured control of SiOOO 

 acres of land in "Dorante's Survey," in the Department of 

 Palanque, Chiapas, Mexico, on which they are planning to plant 

 Castilloa elaslica extensively. There are several other rubber 

 planting companies in the neighborhood of their tract, which is 

 twelve miles from Montecristo, on the Usumacinta river, navi- 

 gable for steamers from the Pacific. The officers include W. H. 

 Beharrell, president ; J. C. Roberts, secretary, and C. V. Cooper, 

 manager, and the offices are in the Chamber of Commerce build- 

 ing, Portland, Oregon. 



THE "IOWA" RUBBER PLANTATION. 



The "Iowa" plantation of The German-American Coffee Co. 

 now includes about 3000 acres of Castilloa rubber, some of it 

 planted as early as 1900, all reported to be in good condition. 

 Experimental tappings will be made this year. The plantation is 

 on the river Michol, near its confluence with the Tulija, about 

 10 miles from El Salto, in the state of Chiapas, Mexico. The 

 company are large producers of coffee, on the "Triunfo" plan- 

 tation, also in Chiapas, opened about 13 years ago. At the last 

 annual meeting it was decided to buy, at a cost of $140,000, the 

 building No. 406 Greenwich street. New York, used by the com- 

 pany as a coffee roasting plant, the purchase to be made from 

 the profits of 1906. The company is a New Jersey corporation, 

 with headquarters in New York and branches in a number of 

 cities. The capital stock issued is $1,541,300. 



CEYLON AND THE MALAY STATES. 



The Pelmadulla Rubber Co., Limited, in Ceylon, with 1,185 

 acres planted to rubber (241,760 trees), estimate the average cost 

 per planted acre at about £8 [=$38.93], which would work out 

 at about 20 cents (gold) per tree. They are tapping a few trees 

 this year. 



The production of rubber by the Anglo-Malay Rubber Co., 

 Limited, in the Malay States, during May was 15,865 pounds 

 against 4,656 pounds in May last year. The production during 

 the twelve months of 1906 reached 91,719 pounds. 



All the shares of the Anglo-Malay Rubber Co. — 150,000 at £1 

 each— have now been issued, and all listed by the London Stock 

 Exchange. 



Lanadron estate, in Johore, owned by F. Pears, yielded 7,305 

 pounds of rubber in April, bringing the total since January i to 

 29,520 pounds. 



At the annual meeting on April 29, of the United Planters' 

 Association of the Federated Malay States that body ceased to 

 exist, but was reorganized immediately as the United Planters' 

 Association of the Malay Peninsula, thus widening to an im- 

 portant extent the territory represented by the membership. R. 

 W. Harrison, chairman of the old association, and H. C. E. 

 Zacharias, secretary, were elected to like positions in the new. 

 Rubber planting will be the chief interest in the enlarged field 

 of the organization, as it was in the old. The tenth annual 

 report of the association showed 153.150 acres in private hands 

 in the Federated Malay States at the end of 1906, with 52,843 

 acres under cultivation, of which 49,033 were under rubber. 



PROFITS FROM "FICUS" AT CHARDUAR. 



Of all the rubber plantations ever formed, probably the one 

 about which most has been written, both in the way of informa- 

 tion and misinformation, is the government experimental planta- 

 tion of Ficus elaslica, formed in 1873 at Charduar, in Assam. 

 This was a small undertaking from the standpoint of acreage, 

 but it has proved such a commercial success that the government 

 is convinced that the experimental stage has now been passed 

 and that the time has now come for disposing of the plantation 

 by sale or lease.. The net revenue for the last year was 23,381 

 rupees [=$7,585-56]. 



TO PLANT RUBBER IN JAVA. 



The Simo Rubber Estates, Limited, was floated in London in 

 June, with ^35,000 capital, to acquire a group of estates known 

 as Simo, in the north of Java, and to develop the cultivated 

 rubber (Castilloa and Ficus elastica) now growing thereon, and 

 to plant Para rubber extensively. The estates already afford a 

 profit from coffee, cacao, indigo, ■ ancj pe^er, which crops are 

 expected to continue in beafftlg untif the Vijbber becomes pro- 

 ductive. The London company takes title from an Amsterdam 

 company, at a valuation of £22,000. The directors of the new 

 company hold similar positions in rubber plantation companies 

 operating in Java and Ceylon. 'A- 



SHANGHAI'S FIRST RUBB'iS COMPANY. ' ', 



The Dominion Rubber Co., Lirhited;' has been formed by 

 English residents of Shanghai, under the; Companies ordinances 

 of Hongkong, with a share capita! of 2^,960 taels [=$168,300, 

 gold], to purchase two rubber plantations in the Federated Malay 

 States. They are G. L. Bailey's "Dominion" estate,..in Selangor, 

 and "Hendra" estate, owned by E. T. C. Garland, in 'Perak — each 

 with 640 acres, with a total of 214 acres planted to rubber within 

 two years, besides nurseries for further planting. The vend6rs 

 take 52,500 taels in shares and 23,100 in cash, the latter being 

 the amount expended on the properties to date. 



