Kaján Imre szerk.: Vásárhelyi Pál és a reformkori mérnökgeneráció (Budapest, 1995)

Amelie Lanier: A hitel nem teremtheti meg saját feltételeit – Néhány megjegyzés a reformkori bank- és pénzügyről 62

morality would be improved and this has the consequence that the procedure of raising a credit becomes easier, since the credit giving person has not be anxious for his money. In the endeavors to change the laws regulating the credit raising was true that the laws of 1848 valid in Hungary hindered the regulated capitalistic credit raising. The changes made by the various diets, first of all that changes made during the diets 1839/40, represented the partial cessation of the restrictions, which impeded the suing for recovery of a credit or the foundation of a joint stock company. But the discussion about the conditions of the credit left the economic basis of the modern credit aside: Enterprises shall exist, which could achieve a profit, and from this the credit raised could be repaid. The credited money promotes the business activity only in the case, where after the deduction of the interest and the rates of the amortization of the company some value of the achieved profit remains. Ifit is not the case then the credit giving side contributed to the deterioration of the existence of the enterprise, since the company could not accomplish the increase of the operating capital, which would be engaged last but not least by the redemption of debts. So the credit before the era of 1848 in Hungary contributed to the deterioration of the old property- and dependence-relations and at the same time hampered the establishment of the profit-oriented undertakings. This could be seen on the example of the private loans: Those were credits, which the Hungarian magnates, i.e. which the nobles having big estates, who raised a loan at the Banking houses of Wien and were unable to repay it. They did not be able to cope with it using the incomes coming from the goods of their estates, and so that required permanently newer credits. From the history of the first manufactures and banking institutions we can see a similar picture. The formers required frequently a further credit for the settlement of the loans or for the payment of the share-dividends. From the actually achieved profit, when they incurred a loss for several years, they could not be able to get the required sum. The banking houses found also few possibilities for the profitable investment of the moneys entrusted to them in the form of deposits or commercial deposits in bank or the money to be found on accounts and made complaints against the money flowing toward them, which they could not be able to use. 66