PROPERTY REGISTER

Evening Post, Volume CXXVIII, Issue 93, 17 October 1939, Page 12

PROPERTY REGISTER

SECURITIES HELD ABROAD

The Commonwealth Government is taking steps to marshal the oversea resources of the nation.. A register is to be compiled of oversea credits in the name of residents of Australia, of stocks, shares, bonds, registered, repayable, or situated outside Australia, and any other property so situate. These properties may be acquired by the Government and used for financing oversea purchases rendered necessary by defence measures. Besides bank credits and foreign exchange Australians own British Government stock, shares in British companies, shares in United States companies, and in tin interests registered abroad. There are, too, some holdings in South African mines. Australian organisations have also interests in Canada. ' ■ Presumably the British methods of acquirement, if acquirement becomes necessary, would be adopted. So far there has been no means of ascertaining the oversea investments of Australians, and probably the Government is largely in the dark as to the value of those-investments. In the last twenty years there have been substantial transactions in British and American securities by Australian citizens with the idea of spreading their investments over a wider field, so as to make for safety. In the war of 1914-18, the scheme originally adopted by the British Government provided alternatives, namely, one, the outright purchase of the I securities in exchange for 5 per cent. Exchequer bonds at market price, plus 12i per cent, premium; or, two, the loan of such securities to the Government in return for a rate of interest, half of 1 per cent, higher than that obtainable on the securities concerned. Under this scheme, the securities handled by the British Treasury amounted to £216,644,396 purchased, and £405,951,189 deposited by loan.