Business & Finance: Risks and Profits

In San Francisco last week lights blazed brightly all night in the building occupied by Amadeo Peter Giannini's giant Bank of America. The bank's 493 branch managers were telephoning in reports, and statisticians were preparing to issue Bank of America's six-month financial statement. Few days before, six major Los Angeles banks, pleading hard times, cut their maximum interest rates on time and savings deposits from 2% to 1½%, but Mr. Giannini swore up & down he would not cut his. "A. P." did not need to, he boasted, for Bank of America was...

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