WEALTH OF AMERICA.

New Zealand Herald, Volume LXV, Issue 19838, 7 January 1928, Page 9

WEALTH OF AMERICA.

VAST FOREIGN INVESTMENTS. LOAN ISSUES FOR ABROAD. (Received January 6, 6.45 p.m.) A. and N.Z. WASHINGTON. Jan. 5. The Department of Commerce announces that American investments abroad reached a total value of £2,600,000,000 at the end of 1927, exclusive of about £2,000,000,000 in war debts owing to America. Foreign issues publicly offered in the United States in 1927 reached a total of approximately £315,000,000. This was the fifth time that the flotations for any year have passed the £200,000,000 mark. The prior instances were in 1916, 1924, 1925 and 1926.

With the announcement that Mr. Charles S. Dewey, Assistant-Secretary of the United States Treasury, has been appointed financial adviser to the Polish Government and Bank of Poland as contemplated in the stabilisation plan drawn up by Professor Edwin W. of Princeton, attention is called •to the widening field of American financiers and economists, said the Christian Science Monitor recently. The stabilisation plan provides for legal stabilisation of the currency, a return to the gold standard, the appointment of an American financial expert as adviser and an international loan of £14,000,000. The Bank of Poland is constituted the only note issuing body, the Government renouncing its right to issue currency notes, which is to be done only in accordance with rigid reserve requirements. Professor Kemmerer, who was called in to work out Poland's problem, has assisted Mexico, Ecuador, the Union of South Africa and a number of other countries in similarly solving their financial problems. His work has been largely advisory, not executive.

Mr. Arthur C. Millspaugh has been for several years embarked on the difficult task of rescuing Persia from its financial difficulties. Mr. Jeremiah Smith, Jun., of Boston, struggled to reorganise the finances of Hungary with great success. Dr. Arthur N Young, economic adviser of the Department of State, has at different times advised . Mexico and Honduras and investigated Spanish finances for the Department of Commerce.

Mr. William L. Schurz has recently completed a mission as financial adviser to the Cuban Treasury and Mr. William W. Cumberland gave Peru a federal reserve system while acting as financial commissioner and superintendent of customs.

It is reported that Mr. Walter Stewart, formerly with the Federal Reserve Board, and now connected with a banking house in New York, has been asked to become an adviser to the Bank of England. In return Sir Basil Blackett, the English financier, occupies a similar position with a member bank of the Federal Reserve System in New York.