British Exchange Banks in the International Trade of Asia from 1850 to 1890

Abstract

From the 1830s onwards, London banks opened offices in Australia, Canada, the West Indies, the Ionian Islands, Mauritius and Ceylon. These banks were incorporated by Royal Charters of the British government and had the right to issue bank notes in their local offices. The British colonies in South and East Asia became included in the networks of the British banks relatively late in the 1850s.1 After the opening of the Suez Canal, these banks in Asia rapidly expanded their activities and began to play a key role, both in the expansion of international trade between Europe and Asia and in the rapidly growing intra-regional Asian trade. The banks soon became an indispensable part of the British Empire all over the region.