Coupon (finance)

“ So, while the promises of the bond and of the coupons in the first instance are upon the same paper, and the coupons are for interest due upon the bond, yet the promise to pay the coupon is as distinct from that to pay the bond as though the two promises were placed in different instruments upon different paper.'
Not only may a suit be maintained upon an unpaid coupon, in advance of the maturity of the principal debt, but the holder of a coupon is entitled to recover interest thereon from its maturity. ”

“ Attached to these bonds are little coupons or slips of paper, each one representing a half or quarter year's in- terest, from the date of purchase to the time when the principal is to be paid off. The coupon bears the name of the bank or agency where it may be cashed, and any banker will negotiate it. ”

“ He then loosens the staple in a book which he himself has drawn at the Exchange and carefully inserts enough of the loose coupon sheets from A’s book to fill it up again, and bends the staple back into its original position. This scheme is of wider prevalence than most Exchange Officers would imagine, and it is very hard to detect.
Another fault to be found with the coupon book lies in the possibility of there being a wrong number of sheets of coupons in it. Printers are but human and it sometimes happens that there are too few or too many coupons in a book. ”

“ For example, during certain days of the month, such as pay day and the first day upon which coupons are issued, it is manifestly impracticable for us to make out a sales slip for each cash or coupon purchase because there are so many five and ten cent purchases that the cost in time and labor involved in such a method would outweigh the advantages gained. If the average sale amounted to a dollar or so, it might pay us to use sales slips similar to those used in recording our charge sales. Therefore, most Exchanges do not require cash or coupon sales to be recorded except on the cash register. ”

“ They now not only keep people's money, but also collect their incomes for them. Many persons live entirely on the income of shares, or debentures, or foreign bonds, which is paid in coupons, and these are handed in for the bank to collect. Often enough the debenture, or the certificate, or the bond is in the custody of the banker, and he is expected to see when the coupon is due, and to cut it off and transmit it for payment. ”

“ If you mail the coupon at the bottom of this ad I will show you the easiest, quickest, simplest plan for making money that you ever heard of. If you are interested in a chance to earn $200 a week and can devote all your time or only an hour or so a day to my proposition, write your name down below, cut out the coupon and mail it to me at once. You take no risk, and this may be the one outstanding opportunity of your life to earn more money than you ever thought possible. ”

“ The use of the money one year is more than sufficient time to print, bind and market a paying edition of an average book. The investor gets for the use of his money 16 per cent. per annum, payable in books (see coupon) ; he also gets an option of purchase (see coupon) which, if he avails himself of it, will, with the 16 per cent., earn and save him at the rate of about 60 per cent. per annum (see Stockholders’ Prices) , on his $10 investment. These bonds are issued in amounts to suit the purchaser, not less than $10 ”

“ The coupon is not an independent instrument, like a promissory note for a sum of money, but is given for interest thereafter to become due upon the bond, which interest is parcel of the bond, and partakes of its nature; and the bond, being of a higher security than a simple contract debt, is not barred by lapse of time short of twenty years ”

“ If a fifty-dollar coupon on a bond bought seventy or eighty bushels of wheat instead of twenty or thirty, the advantage to the owner of the coupon was obvious. Moreover the advantage seemed to him entirely just. Creditors had suffered heavy losses when the Civil War carried prices skyward while the interest rates on their old bonds remained stationary. For example, if a man had a $1000 bond issued before 1860 and paying interest at five per cent, he received fifty dollars a year from it. ”

“ Unlike gold and silver, the new currency possesses no intrinsic value, but it consists simply of orders or cheques drawn on the State as the sole possessor of all articles of sale.
Every labourer in the service of the State receives once a fortnight a series of money certificates in the form of a coupon booklet. The name of each holder is printed on the cover, and with a view to preventing the use of the coupons by other persons, it is enacted that the photograph of every individual holder be attached to his book of coupons. ”

“ The bonds shall be made payable to order or bearer, and the coupons to bearer, and registered bonds payable to order may be exchanged for bonds payable to bearer, and registered bonds may be exchanged for coupon bonds, or vice versa, at the option of the holder. The coupons shall be payable semi-annually, and be receivable at and after maturity for all taxes, debts, dues, and demands due the state, which shall be expressed on their face. ”

“ Sprague of two past-due unpaid interest coupons make the bonds dishonored paper?
Coupons are separable obligations for the interest payable upon demand. It constantly occurs that they are not demanded for weeks and months, and sometimes years, after they are due. As they bear interest after maturity, it will frequently happen that the owner of a bond who holds it as an investment will keep the coupon for the same purpose.
Bonds executed by a railroad company may not be put upon the market until one or more coupons have matured. ”

“ The logical effect of these rulings is that when the interest evidenced by a coupon has become due and payable the demand based upon the promise contained in such coupon is no longer a mere incident of the principal indebtedness represented by the bond, but becomes really a principal obligation. Clearly, such would be the nature of the claim of one who, as owner of the coupons, and not of the bonds, brought his action to enforce payment of the indebtedness evidenced by the coupons. ”

“ Our conclusion is, that the cause of action is not barred by lapse of time short of twenty years. Recurring again to the declaration, we have said that the preamble, or inducement, was unnecessary, and might well be rejected as surplusage. As we have seen, it recites, in very general terms, the bonds to which the several coupons in suit were annexed. Now, each coupon itself contains substantially, on its face, all this information. It is issued for interest due at a certain day and place on a bond, giving its number and date. ”

“ There is a large concern in Chicago which advertises to send you a one hundred dollar diamond ring for a two-cent stamp; and they do it, too. Here is the way the scheme is worked: An agent of the company sells you a ticket or coupon for one dollar. You send the ticket and nine dollars in cash to the firm, which in turn sends you ten other coupons. You sell these coupons to your friends for one dollar each, thereby getting your money back. Your friends must each do the same as you did, selling their coupons to their friends. ”

“ The coupon-book system of extending credit to enlisted men will be used by all exchanges conducted at posts where more than two organizations are stationed, except at temporary stations and at places where conditions of service have made it impracticable to procure the coupon books. ”

“ A square foot of a coupon represents a sum of money spent in the store—perhaps one dollar. Every woman by measuring her room can{28} learn how many dollars’ worth of goods she must buy before she can have a free carpet.
28. The House Lot Coupon.—This is an extension of carpet coupon. A certain amount of purchased goods entitles one to a building lot, which, if in the country, need not be of great cost. Have the particular lots selected and advertised. Another plan is to offer the lot to the largest purchaser within a certain time—possibly five years. This is a good way to hold on to customers. ”

“ That the Secretary of the Treasury is hereby authorized to issue, in a sum or sums not exceeding in the aggregate $200,000,000, coupon or registered bonds of the United States, in such form as he may prescribe, and of denominations of $50, or some multiple of that sum, redeemable in coin of the present standard value, at the pleasure of the United States, after ten years from the date of their issue, and bearing interest, payable semi-annually in such coin, at the rate of five per cent. per annum ”

“ In short, we think that, in the common understanding, 'interest' means what is usually called interest by those who pay and those who receive the amount so denominated in bond and coupon, and that the words of the statute permit the deduction of that sum, and do not refer to some esoteric concept derived from subtle and theoretic analysis. ”

“ The yard-porter was an illiterate man, but he said he had had such coupons given him by lodgers to change; that they were good; but that one might also chance on forged ones; so he advised the peasant, for the sake of security, to change it at once at the counter. Ivan Mironov gave the coupon to the waiter and asked for change. The waiter, however, did not bring the change, but came back with the manager, a bald-headed man with a shining face, who was holding the coupon in his fat hand.
"Your money is no good," he said, showing the coupon, but apparently determined not to give it back. ”

“ It would be unbusinesslike, if the coupon or charge sales are heavy, to require the Exchange Officer, the Steward or any other high priced man to waste his time counting coupons or any other similar task. A less expensive employee should be detailed for this purpose. For such unskilled labor, a boy at $10.00 per month who can run errands, etc., would be a profitable investment in many cases, thus leaving the expensive employees free to do more important work. ”

“ The receivability of the coupon, under the funding act of 1871, for taxes, dues, and demands, gave to it, as already said, its principal value. At that time there was provided, in the system of procedure of this state, a remedy for the specific execution of the contract, by which this receivability could be enforced. ”

“ There was a very tight money market, and extraordinary commissions—at rates often exceeding one hundred per cent.—were charged for loans. Mr. Villard argued against the payment, which could be made only by borrowing a large part of the required amount at a heavy extra cost, as only a short makeshift, but he was not heeded, and the payment of the coupon began with little over one half of the $1,500,000 needed in hand. As was to be foreseen, default was postponed for only a few weeks, and, by mid-August, receivers were appointed for the whole system. ”

“ As each coupon bears the same number as the outside cover, and every holder is entered in the Government registry, it is an easy matter at any time to learn from the collected coupons the way in which each person has expended his income. The Government is thus, at any moment, in a position to observe [37] whether persons spend their income on dress, or on eating and drinking, or how they spend it; and knowledge of this kind must materially lessen the difficulty of regulating production and consumption. ”

“ I asked. "I have cut out a coupon," he said, wringing his hands, "and sent it in." "To where?" I asked. "To Department B. The Success Editor, Box 440-J. Phoenix, Arizona." "My dear friend," I said, "cutting out a coupon pledges you to nothing." He left my office (after in vain offering me money) a new being. ”

“ The only question of difficulty which can arise in any case is as to the mode of relief which the owner of such coupon is entitled to in case they are refused when properly tendered in making his payment, or as to the cases which may be excepted from the operation of his right; for, almost from the start, the legislature of Virginia has from time to time enacted various laws calculated to embarrass the holders of said coupons in the free use of them for the payment of taxes and other dues. ”

“ Section 6, however, provided a special fund out of which claims of this character might be paid, and as this consisted of coupon bonds dated in 1874 and maturing 50 years later, the provision to the effect that coupons maturing after the date upon which the claim was due and payable should accompany the bonds amounted to giving interest at a limited rate, before and after judgment, where payment was made in that mode. ”

“ The adoption of the premium advertising system enables complainants to give a discount upon purchases of small as well as large amounts, one coupon or stamp being given with each 5, 10, or 25-cent cash purchase, or multiple thereof, as the case may be. And a larger discount in merchandise can be given than otherwise there could be because, as a result of large purchases of the merchandise given in exchange for the tokens, the articles are secured at much less than the regular retail price. ”

“ The color should then be shifted and when coupons of the old color cease appearing, we can arrive at an approximate check on our outstanding coupon account. We say “approximate” because it sometimes happens that a man puts away a whole or a partially used book in a garment and thus inadvertently retires it from circulation for a space of time that may stretch into months. Of course, this could be prevented by issuing a notice that all coupons must be presented before a certain time, and that after that time, no coupons of the old colors would be accepted. ”