Western Bankers Meet In Basle

Press, Volume CVIII, Issue 31857, 9 December 1968, Page 15

Western Bankers Meet In Basle

(N.Z.P.A.-Reuter—Copyright)

BASLE, December 8.

Western central bankers have flown to Basle for their monthly round of consultations, the first since the Bonn monetary conference two weeks ago.

As signs of a fresh monetary crisis gathered on the horizon, the bankdrs began informal talks in hotels and restaurants before their meetings today and tomorrow. The “back door” revaluation of the West German mark and France’s austerity measures have calmed currency speculation since the Bonn meeting, but foreign exchange markets were nervous again on Thursday and Friday. Speculators hoping for an official revaluation were buy-

ing Deutschmarks, and sterling was under pressure close to its floor level—where the banks intervene to support it—but movements were small compared with last month's crisis.

Some Swiss sources say the bankers will have to complete arrangements for the SNZI7B6m stand-by credit granted to France in Bonn, based on bilateral currency exchanges during an initial three-month period between the central banks of the countries concerned and France. The bankers, from Western Europe, the United States, Canada, and Japan, will be meeting against a background of reports that South Africa has again been selling bullion on the free market in Zurich.

Though there has been no confirmation that gold will figure on their agenda, it is possible that they might try to agree on new terms to offer South Africa for the purchase of its gold by central banks.