CASH RESOURCES

Ashburton Guardian, Volume 61, Issue 44, 2 December 1940, Page 8

CASH RESOURCES

THE POSITION OF BRITAIN.,

NO SALE OF POSSESSIONS

(United Press Association—Copyright }

WASHINGTON, November 28. The Secretary of the Treasury (Mr Henry Morgenthau, jun. said the question of the United States taking over British possessions in the Western Hemisphere should not be considered until Britain exhausts her liquid assets. He said Britain has no reason to consider selling her possessions to raise cash and indicated that Britain has still large reserves of cash and negotiable securities in the western hemisphere. t Making his first statement after his return from an inspection of the United States bases in the (Caribbean, Mr Morgenthau dpclared that he was tremendously impressed by the deal giving the United States the right to lease bases. The deai was possibly the most important thing since the leasing of the Panama Canal. It is officially stated in Washington that in the first year of the war Britain expended nearly £79,000,000 of her capital assets in the United States on war supplies. At the end of the first year the cash remaining was still at least £96,000,000, excluding gold. The Washington correspondent of the “Journal of Commerce,” a New York publication, says that Britain'has provided more than 200,000,000 dollars for the expansion of United States aircraft munitions and arms manufacttiring industries since the war began. She expects to places nearly 2,000,000,000 dollars worth of additional orders in the coming year.

Of the 200,000,000 dollars spent on expanding industry, 120,000,000 dollars has gone to aircraft industry, and 80,000,000 dollars to five other lines of war production. Orders at present total 2,500,000,000 dollars, 70 per cent, of which is for aeroplanes and engines and the remainder for artillery, munitions and arms. The correspondent adds that the programme is intended to carry on through tho summer.