Share of 500 francs issued in Boulogne-sur-Mer (North of France) in 1920.

Nice vignette reminding the Boulogne Harbour. The Oustric scandal has involved this Boulogne bank into brankrupcy.

Albert Oustric, born in 1887, was in turn an errand boy, wine representative, amateur singer in a few brasseries, before calling himself a banker in 1919. He then opened an office in rue Auber in Paris, where he officiated as manager of a bank, Banque Oustric, in a limited partnership with a capital of one million francs, of which only a quarter was paid. Oustric is a smart man. He greatly helped in the successful careers of Union-Vie, Blanchisseries de Thaon, and even Peugeot. Until 1925, under cover of his bank, Oustric forged many relationships with politicians. His connections enabled him to obtain the agreement of the Ministry of Finance and the Ministry of Foreign Affairs to have the shares of an Italian artificial silk company listed on the Paris Stock Exchange: La Snia Viscosa.

In 1925, the Frenchman Albert Oustric met Riccardo Gualino, the founder of SNIA Viscosa. The two men dream of building together a Franco-Italian industrial conglomerate, based on the textile industry and its derivatives.

In June 1926, Oustric interceded with Raoul Péret, French Minister of Finance, to obtain the right to introduce SNIA Viscosa to the first market of the Paris stock exchange. The right is granted and the capitalization is a success, since 500,000 shares find takers.

In 1928, the Gualino-Oustric industrial empire was at its peak: it included 17 companies in textiles and clothing (Salpa, Ehrlich frères, Athos, Maréchal, Sarlino, Blanchisseries de Thaon, Filatures Valentin-Bloch), of haute couture (Doeuillet-Doucet, Germaine Patat) of which he took control via Georges Aubert, or industrial and land like the silver mines of Compania Huanchaca in Bolivia, or Ciments de Couzon.

He then pushed the idea of ​​speculation to the extreme, on the American model. But the pearl of his financial package remains Bank Adam, which he took control that same year.

During the year 1929, he even became a member of the Peugeot board of directors and the main banker of the automobile brand, always supported by Gualino. The capital of the Oustric bank then amounts to 127 million francs, or more than 127 times its starting capital.

But the Oustric bank is nothing: above, there is a Franco-Italian financial company, the French Holding, through which Gaulino and Oustric, between 1928 and October 1929, control large companies, through a set-up in which intervenes also Banque Bauer, Marchal et Cie. The overall consolidated turnover exceeds one billion francs.

But the affair ended badly with the bankruptcy of the Oustric Bank following the crash of 1929, dragging in its wake the Adam bank and all the satellite companies. The politician Raoul Péret was incriminated and Oustric and Gualino ended up in prison.