Signed by Nathan Mayer Rothschild & Joseph Cohen. Russian Empire Five Percent Annuity Bond Paid in London.

Nathan Mayer Rothschild (1777-1836), Baron de Rothschild, was an English-German businessman and financier, one of the four brothers from the second generation of the Rothschild banking dynasty, which was to become N.M. Rothschild & Sons. He was the first man of Jewish faith to be admitted to the House of Lords. A Freemason, in the aftermath of the Abolition of Slavery Act (1833) and the Slave Compensation Act (1837), Rothschild and his business partner Moses Montefiore loaned the British Government £15 million (worth £1.51 billion in 2022) with interest which was subsequently paid off by the British taxpayers (ending in 2015). The money was used to compensate the slave owners of the British Empire after the Slave Trade had been abolished. In 1875 Nathan Mayer's eldest son, Lionel Nathan Rothschild (1808-1879), who succeeded his father as manager of their London banking branch, financed the British government's purchase of a controlling interest in the Suez Canal.

The Bond is printed in Russian on its front and in both English and French on the back. It is initiated by the Russian Minister of Finance at St. Petersburg, and provided for a perpetual annuity of 3360 Roubles or £518 on the investor's money. The crowned two-headed Imperial Russian eagle sits at the top of the first page and the document also includes various official stamps and seals, with the embossed seal at lower right reading: 'RUSSIAN LOAN 1822 CONTRACTED BY - N. M. ROTHSCHILD'.

The unused bond interest payment talon is for £148, quite a large sum at the time. Alexander I (1777-1825, reign in the years 1801-1825) was on the Russian throne and St. Petersburg was considered to be an important social and artistic centre of Europe.

This Russian bond from 1822 is widely recognised as the first Eurobond. Issued by the Rothschild banking dynasty in London, Frankfurt, Paris and Vienna, the bond promised payment in European currencies, as well as in Russian Rubles. Perhaps more importantly, dividends could be claimed in any of the above cities - effectively protecting the bondholder from the effects of a continental war, if they were forced to flee their country. The unlucky bondholders who remained in Russia after the Revolution of 1917 most likely lost all their investments.

Two printed paper sheets (36 x 24.4 cm; 20.8 x 4.2 cm), printed on both sides; signatures of Nathan Mayer Rothschild and Joseph Cohen; marginal tears and cracks along the fold lines; blind-stamp of N. M. Rothschild.