Abstract

"Hope and Baring in Russia: Sovereign Financing and Commerce at the Making of a New European Order, 1788-1830"

Hadar Hoter-ishay, University of Vienna (hhi5112@gmail.com)

The paper examines the dual role of high finance and commerce in the activities of Hope & Co. of Amsterdam and Baring Brothers & Co. of London, the main European financial agents of the Russian Empire from the late 18th century. While commerce and sovereign finance are often studied separately, merchant bankers’ involvement in both areas calls for a more integrated perspective. Through the case of Hope and Baring in Russia, the paper highlights the reciprocity and mutual support between trade and finance.
It argues that Hope and Baring’s sustained engagement in Russian sovereign lending depended on their ability to combine financial intermediation with commercial enterprise, enabling them to manage the risks of underwriting large foreign loans amid political instability, currency devaluation, and wartime disruptions. These were non-specialized merchant bankers in the literal sense, using commodity exchanges to support and expand sovereign loan operations.
Drawing on correspondence, negotiation memoranda, ledgers, and loan records, the paper shows the commercial applications of Russian bonds, serving as liquid, transferable assets employed as collateral and as a means of settlement in trade. The firms’ financial and commercial activities were structurally interdependent: profits from trade financed bond operations, while bond collateral sustained new commercial ventures. This interplay is shown in initiatives such as the large-scale importation of silver into Russia to secure metallic payments on debts, revealing how merchant bankers converted financial obligations into tangible flows of goods and specie.
Finally, the paper examines the mechanisms of intermediation between Hope and Baring and the Russian government, from designated agents like Robert Voûte and Hieronymus Sillem to local firms such as Bergien & Co. and Stieglitz & Co. Their activities show how merchant banking united diplomacy, finance, and commerce into a single transnational system that blurred the boundaries between the state apparatus and private enterprise.