COMMONWEALTH BANK.

New Zealand Herald, Volume LXVI, Issue 20426, 30 November 1929, Page 13

COMMONWEALTH BANK.

PROPOSED AMENDING ACT.

RIGHTS REGARDING GOILD<

COMPULSORY ACQUISITION.

By Telegraph—Press Association —Copyright.

CANBERRA, Nov. 29,

The Federal Treasurer, Mr. E. G. Theodore, in the Housa of Representatives introduced a bill to amend the Common"vvealth Bank Act. The bill would, empower the Treasurer to authorise the bank to require any person to furnish particulars of gold coin and bullion held by him and to require any person to exchange for Australian notes any gold coin and bullion held by him.

The British Currency and Bank Notes Act, 1928, provides, " with a view to the concentration of the gold reservesi and to the securing of economy in the use of gold," that " any person owning any gold coin or bullion to an amount exceeding £IO,OOO in value shall, on being required so to do by notice in writing from the Bank (of England), forthwith furnish to the Bank in writing particulars of the gold coin and bullion owned by that person, and shall, if so 'required by the Bank, sell to the Bank the whole or any part of the said coin or bullion, other than any part thereof, which i 3 bona-fide held for immediate export or which is bona-fide required for industrial purposes, on payment therefor by the Bank, in the case of coin, of the nominal value thereof, and in the case of bullion, afc the rate fixed in section 4 of the Bank Charter Act, 1844." i

Commenting on this provision in his recently-published " International ' Gold Movements," Dr. Paul Einzig, foreign editor of the Financial News and of the Banker, says the object of the clause is " to concentrate in the hands of the central institution all gold available in the country for monetary purposes, so as to provide for the -Requirements arising from the international monetary use of gold."