WOOL OUTLOOK.

Manawatu Standard, Volume LVII, Issue 220, 17 August 1937, Page 5

WOOL OUTLOOK.

NEW SEASON’S APPROACH. SMALLER CARRY-OVER. Interest in tho new wool season is already being aroused. The new season’s sales will open in Sydney on August 30 and it is expected that competition will show a more confident tone than a year ago. Although some countries are expected to register a slight increase in production in the hew season, this will be offset by the smaller quantities carried over. The competition of Japan and the United States will again bo an important factor in the coming season. According to Winchcombe, Carson, Limited, Australian woolbrokers, United States mill consumption has not been ns great as earlier in the year, but from January to March the quantity of wool used was the largest recorded for the period since 1923, when trade was more or less booming. The imports of apparel wools in 1936 were 118,000,0001 b greasy, tho largest recorded since 1926, and during the first threo months of 1937 were 119,297,0001 b.

The demand for the new home-grown clip in the United States was fairly active in June, but purchases were not being made as freely as a year ago. Good prices, however, were being paid for the wool bought. Grades of Kentucky wool secured at 23 cents per lb in 1936 were purchased at 30 cents this year. Apparently the large importations of the sheep’s staple made and the seasonally easier turnover at the mills have not destroyed confidence in prices in the United States. During the year ended June 30, 1937, exports of wool from Australia to America were 263,085 bales, an increase of 244,069 bales on the figures of two years before. She also imported wool in larger quantities from South Africa, New Zealand, South America and the United Kingdom.

Good competition from Japan is expected at the forthcoming Australian sales, as 6he has still a minimum quota of approximately 500,000 bales to buy in the Commonwealth in the 12 months ahead.