After the disastrous first year of the company an extraordinary meeting of shareholders was convened on 25 March 1872. The apparent reasons were the disaster of "SS Willem III" and the screw problems of "Prins van Oranje" and "Prins Hendrik" causing so much trouble for the SMN that she was out of money. This meeting took place in the Amstelhotel. The directors wanted to change the articles of association of the company, and to issue a convertible loan of 3,500,000 guilders. A critic noted that the board gave a rather limited account of why it needed more money to strengthen the capital, and why it wanted to buy two more ships. He wanted more details about how the stock of 3,500,000 had been spent and about the profitability of the first trips. He also wanted details about the problems with the ships built in Scotland.