At the Select Committee on Indian Railways in 1884 the disappointing early performance of Bengal NW was highlighted. Edward Charles Baring (first Baron Revolstoke) as senior partner of Baring Brothers, director of the Bank of England, and later chairman of Lloyds held 25,000 shares (over 10 per cent of the issue). Alfred Charles de Rothschild, also a Bank of England director, had an equal investment. Edward Baring's brother, Evelyn, was instrumental in guiding Calcutta and Whitehall towards this new generation of joint stock railway companies without guarantees, but subsequently pressed Viceroy Ripon to offer guarantees and other government support for ‘productive’ as well as ‘protective’ lines. Through government concessions, Bengal NW's unguaranteed stock was expected to recover. However, Bengal NW coupled with Baring/Rothschild family short-term investments in the Nizam of Hyderabad's guaranteed railway company prompted Richard Strachey to describe representatives of the banks as ‘in a certain sense speculators’ as was ‘everybody who put his money in such an undertaking’.

Use of the pejorative term ‘speculator’ to describe the two dominant banking families of late Victorian London caused consternation amongst committee members. In Victorian society, speculation was located somewhere between respectable investment activities and illegitimate. In fact, the risk undertaken by Baring and Rothschild families was removed from conventional ideas of ‘speculation’. The Baring family straddled the government and City divide in the context of Indian railways. Meanwhile, Rothschild, more than Baring, avoided all corporate risk, preferring to underwrite and invest in sovereign bond issues.