MONEY-LENDING PROFITS.

Taranaki Daily News, 12 November 1921, Page 11

MONEY-LENDING PROFITS.

HUNDREDS PER 'CENT,«s . .... —. ACCOUNTS TO BE REOPENED. Sydney., October 25. That the days of exorbitant interest charges are not yet past was proved by an amazing case which, came before the Full Court of Western Australia during the past week. It was shown that a poultry-farmer named A. L. Ballantyne was paying to a moneylender named Rachel Evans interest amounting to several hundreds per centl and the court, in deciding under the Money Lenders’ Act, that the interest should not exceed 50 per cent., ordered all the transactions between the parties since June, to be reopened and an account taken.

The Chief Justice said that Ballan- ; type had obtained from the defendant I a great many loans, varying from j£2o to £200; the interest charges made/ by the defendant varied from 100 to 500 per cent. The charge for interest had in most cases been paid., It was, said His Honor, very difficult to calculate accurately the actual interest paid over the whole period of the transactions, but in February the plaintiff paid 450 per cent., in 510 per cent., and in April 405 per cent., or an average of 435 per cent. The interest charge was so monstrous as to show by itself that the transaction was harsh and unconscionable. . Although facts had been proved to explain or justify this high rate, th? defendant never ran any great amount of risk, and plaintiff must have -berm -fairly regular in keeping up his payments. The general conditions of the case were those which existed where a person of no tangible security had to resort to a moneylender. It seemed to him, therefore, that the accounts should ba re opened from June (J, 1919,