The stock selling and trading business at this time, to which Shinnosuke devoted his energies, could still be described as primitive. At the beginning of the Meiji era, no system existed for the private formation of capital, and the industrial enterprises of the 1870s were founded with government funds raised by bond issues. A shortage of capital soon forced the government to open up the field to private enterprise. Beginning with railroads, the formation of joint-stock companies spread quickly to mining and cotton spinning. The capital itself was provided by banks, the stocks serving as collateral for the loans.
