Oct. 5 (Bloomberg) -- Deutsche Bank AG'S first share certificate, issued on Sept. 1, 1871, and presented to Chairman Max Steinthal in 1929, will be auctioned in London next month for an estimated 20,000 pounds ($35,652), said James Morton of auction house Morton & Eden.

The stock certificate, numbered 00001 and printed by Giesecke & Devrient of Leipzig, was found in a Dresden museum's basement during the 2002 floods with an art collection that is being sold for Steinthal's heirs by New York-based Sotheby's Holdings Inc., the No. 1 auction house. Sotheby's passed the share certificate to London-based Morton & Eden, specialists in coins, medals and paper money, Morton said in an interview.

Collectors are about to get a flood of old shares because German authorities have started to auction stock certificates confiscated by the Nazis during World War II, according to Morton. Rarer items such as the initial share of Europe's third- biggest bank might still fetch high prices, he said.

``I'm sticking my neck out frankly in estimating this one,'' he said. ``I think it's just about the most historic thing you could have.''

Last year, Morton sold an original share certificate issued in 1777 by the Iron Bridge Trust that funded the iron bridge in Shropshire, England, for 6,350 pounds including his commission. Deutsche Bank's first share is worth about three times as much, he said.

Deutsche Bank emerged from a union of smaller German banks, according to Morton. He said he had heard of collectors paying as much as 10,000 pounds each for the bank's share certificates issued in the later 1870s.

Historical Interest

Such shares have generally been canceled and cannot be traded on an exchange. Collectors, who buy them for their rarity, decorative features or historical interest, often work in financial businesses, Morton said. A Deutsche Bank share currently trades at about 61 euros.

Steinthal, born in 1850, became a director of Deutsche Bank at the age of 23 and resigned as chairman in 1935 when he was 85 because his Jewish faith had become ``a political embarrassment,'' according to Sotheby's. His achievements include the founding of Berlin's underground railways while at the bank, Sotheby's said.

The banker died penniless in 1940 a few days before he was due to be sent to a concentration camp, having saved his art by entrusting it to his Aryan son-in-law, the auction house said.

When the Communists seized the son-in-law's property after World War II, they stored seven boxes containing the art collection in Dresden's Gemaldegalerie without ever opening them, said Mitzi Mina, a spokeswoman for New York-based Sotheby's. The museum traced Steinthal's heirs after finding the boxes during the flood and restored the collection to them, she said.

To contact the reporter on this story: Linda Sandler in London at lsandler@bloomberg.net.

Last Updated: October 5, 2004 09:26 EDT