GERMAN BORROWING.

Wairarapa Age, Volume XXXI, Issue 9091, 18 May 1908, Page 7

GERMAN BORROWING.

•j* r jsi rea ' : surprise, says the London '"Timep," was expressed in tho city ■on its becoming known that German .Imperial and Prussian loans to the ..a4«u nt of ho-Ipss than £32,500,000 are to be issued to the German public, and the astonishment at the total, which is very much more than had been expected, was increased by the announcement that the huge mass of new .securities to be < created is to consist of non-convert-ible 4 per cents. The fact that .£10,000,000 of Prussian 4 per cent. <five-year bonds, which will not be '•offered for public subscription, have been taken by the same syndicate ■which-has taken the loans, still further added to the unfavourable impression produced by the news. An interesting feature of this demand on the capitalists of the German Empire lis that it is a return to the usual practice in regard to the agency by which the securities are to be placed. The Prussian Government recently tried -aremarkble experiment; last January it sold bonds, so to speak, "over the -counter," without mentioning what total was for sale, and without the of the group of powerful ibauks who are aiding the Imperial and Prussian Governments' on this ••occasion. The (xperiment, which *had other curious features, produced -about £9,000,000, and was officially • spoken of as a success, but there is ■ver*-£ood reason for thinking that th*Jovernment had hoped to obtain .a good deal more than this. At any irate, it seems clear that the operation must have swallowed up so much <of the free savings of tho people of 'Germany that not only could no repetition of it be attompled, but it has been found necessary this time to • offer better terms to investors. 'There is to be no automatic reduc- • tior. of the rate of interest at intervals of years during its currency, as was the casa with the Prussian issue •of January last, and no condition is now made tlat the bonds are not to be sold befcrj the end of the present year,' such as was impo3ed on .-subscribers then. Prussia, it will «be seen, i 3 getting the lion's share of the proceeds, as lions are apt to <Jo when they are in partnership with smaller animals. The Prussian spolicy of expropriating the Poles and • extending .the State railways is going to cost a great deal, and it is likely that the rapidity with which both "fie Empire, and the kingdom which is its backbone, are piling up dent in time of psace would meet with more opposition, were it not that the distribution of seats for tha Imperial .-Keichstag and ( the antiquated suffrage for the Piusaian Diet make it difficult :i'or public opinion to make itself felt in opposi:ion to G-ivernment proposals.