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For many years, there has been considerable mystery about who 

actually owns the stock of the Federal Reserve Banks. Congressman 

Wright Patman, leading critic of the System, tried to find out who the 

stockholders were. The stock in the original twelve regional Federal 

Reserve Banks was purchased by national banks in those twelve 

regions. Because the Federal Reserve Bank of New York was to set the 

interest rates and direct open market operations, thus controlling the 

daily supply and price of money throughout the United States, it is the 

stockholders of that bank who are the real directors of the entire 

system. For the first time, it can be revealed who those stockholders 

are. This writer has the original organization certificates of the twelve 

Federal Reserve Banks, giving the ownership of shares by the national 

banks in each district. The Federal Reserve Bank of New York issued 

203,053 shares, and, as filed with the Comptroller of the Currency May 

19,  1914,  the  large  New  York  City  banks  took  more  than  half  of  the 

outstanding shares. The Rockefeller Kuhn, Loeb-controlled National 

City Bank took the largest number of shares of any bank, 30,000 shares. 

J.P. Morgan’s First National Bank took 15,000 shares. When these two 

banks merged in 1955, they owned in one block almost one fourth of 

the shares in the Federal Reserve Bank of New York, which controlled 

the entire system, and thus they could name Paul Volcker or anyone 

else they chose to be Chairman of the Federal Reserve Board of 

Governors. Chase National Bank took 6,000 shares. The Marine Nation 

Bank of Buffalo, later known as Marine Midland, took 6,000 shares. This 

bank was owned by the Schoellkopf family, which controlled Niagara 

Power Company and other large interests. National Bank of 

Commerce of New York City took 21,000 shares. The shareholders of 

these banks which own the stock of the Federal Reserve Bank of New