Beautiful specimen warrant certificate from
Bache Group Inc. printed in 1980. This historic document was printed by the Security - Columbian Company and has an ornate border around it with the company name centered on top. This item has the printed signatures of the Company’s Chairman of the Board, and Secretary.
Certificate Vignette
The Bache Group Inc. was parent company of Bache Halsey Stuart Shields Inc..
Halsey, Stuart (later Bache Halsey Stuart Shields) was a Chicago-based investment bank founded in 1911.
In 1952, the firm made headlines when its managing partner, Harold L. Stuart, testified before the U.S. Supreme Court for the government's antitrust case against Morgan Stanley and 16 other major investment banks. The fact that Halsey, Stuart was a significant Wall Street player (responsible for the most IPOs in 1951) led some observers to suspect that they had provoked the government's antitrust suit.
The firm was purchased by Bache & Co. in 1974 to form Bache Halsey Stuart Shields & Co. The combined firm was acquired by Prudential Insurance in 1981, leading to the creation of Prudential-Bache Securities.
About Specimen CertificatesSpecimen Certificates are actual certificates that have never been issued. They were usually kept by the printers in their permanent archives as their only example of a particular certificate. Sometimes you will see a hand stamp on the certificate that says "Do not remove from file".
Specimens were also used to show prospective clients different types of certificate designs that were available. Specimen certificates are usually much scarcer than issued certificates. In fact, many times they are the only way to get a certificate for a particular company because the issued certificates were redeemed and destroyed. In a few instances, Specimen certificates were made for a company but were never used because a different design was chosen by the company.
These certificates are normally stamped "Specimen" or they have small holes spelling the word specimen. Most of the time they don't have a serial number, or they have a serial number of 00000. This is an exciting sector of the hobby that has grown in popularity over the past several years.