Page "Sir Francis Baring, 1st Baronet" Paragraph 4

Initially, the London business comprised the accounts and goodwill transferred to it from an old family friend, Nathaniel Paice, a London merchant who was retiring, but also much business came from John and Charles Baring & Co. and other Exeter merchants who required a London agent.

Agency services for overseas merchants and trading speculations were soon added.

But the firm lost money in eight of its first fourteen years, as Francis Baring learned how to judge markets ; having started out with £ 10, 000 he reckoned that by 1777 his net worth stood at just £ 2500.