DOLLAR HOLDINGS

Wairarapa Times-Age, 20 February 1940, Page 6

DOLLAR HOLDINGS

,CALLED UP BY BRITAIN. By Telegraph—Press Association—Copyright. LONDON. February 19. A Treasury order announces the first call-up of Britain’s dollars. It compels investors in the United Kingdom with holdings in GO nominated United States railway and industrial undertakings to sell to the Government. It is hoped investors will reinvest in British Government stocks. It is believed that £24,000.000 is involved. Saturday's Wall Street prictes will be paid at an exchange rate of four dollars, 3J cents to the £. ACTION WELCOMED. NO HINT OF SHORTAGE. NEW YORK, February 19. The sequestration of British investors’ holdings in leading American stocks is generally welcomed as their liquidation by the Bank of England is felt to be far more orderly than by small holders. There is no hint of a shortage of the dollar exchange as the large British balances are constantly replenished by steady sales of gold and securities. The Federal Reserve Board estimates that the Empire's holdings of good securities in the United States exceed three billion dollars. The Washington correspondent of the "New York Times” says it is felt that the sequestration may portend an expansion of British purchases from the United States. In Washington yesterday the Federal Reserve Board reported that the volume of the United States’ production dropped from the level of 128 in December, 1939, to 120 in January. It adds that the slump continues in steel ingot production, which was above 90 per cent of capacity at the close of the year but declined to G 9 per cent by the middle of February. The Secretary of Commerce, Mr Harry Hopkins, reports that the 1939 balance of foreign trade is 24 per cent below 1938. Exports rose 5 per cent and imports 15 per cent. He adds that there is a heavy and persistent inflow of foreign capital.