The Annual Report published by the Board of Trade under
the Companies Winding-up Act is a very interesting docu- ment. The total number of new companies during last, year was 3,596, the number of cases in which winding-up pro- ceedings were begun was 1,629, and the number of companies removed from the Register on other grounds was 1,801. The total amount of capital involved in liquidation was over £64,000,000, but, as the Inspector-General points out, it must not be assumed that the whole of this sum has been lost, as a considerable proportion of the loss incurred by the holders of vendors' shares was never represented by real assets. Attention is called to the enormGus increase in the number of private companies—i.e., companies registered without issuing a prospectus and inviting the public to subscribe—which is now sixty-one per cent. of the total. The Inspector-General thinks that the public require protection in the ease of such companies by the extension to them of Section 6 of the Com- panies Act, which compels the publication of full particulars.
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