OVERSEAS TRADE

Evening Post, Volume CII, Issue 5, 6 July 1921, Page 6

OVERSEAS TRADE

(FROM OUR OWN COItRESPONBINT.)

LONDON, 13th May. At the annual meeting of one of tho largest London wholesale drapers last week, some indication waß given of the present position in that trade and the relations with the Overseas Dominions. Until tho ■ coal % strike occurred in October, 1920, tho volume of business increased, though at a much Ices rate than in the first half of the year, but from then onward business became increasingly bad, tho tendency in this direction being fo6tered" by a- campaign in. America and here, which held out exaggerated hopes of a rapid reduction in prices if only the public would abstain from buying. New business overseas was stopped by tho the fall in foreign exchanges and by the difficulties of the Dominion in exporting their raw materials, on which they depended for the exchange of goods. As a consequence of falling prices mid difficult exchange, the company in question had orders cancelled and goods refused by thoir oversens customers to the amount of about £750,000, so that they had not only lost tho profit they would havo made on this amount, but had to write down to their market value the goods returned. The main source of aa\iety at present, it wae declared, waa that nil overseas trade was under a cloud, and there were no signs of that cloud lifting in the immediate future.