REDUCTION OF INTEREST.

New Zealand Herald, Volume LXIX, Issue 21136, 19 March 1932, Page 13

REDUCTION OF INTEREST.

OPPOSITION TO SUGGESTION. STOCK EXCHANGE ALARMED. ["BY TELEGRAPH. —PRESS ASSOCIATION."! WELLINGTON, Friday. The Wellington Slock Exchange has sent a letter to the Prime Minister, Rt. Hon. G. W. Forbes, and the Minister of Finance, Hon. W. Downie 'Stewart, expressing in strongest terms its fears of the consequences should the Government reduce the return !o internal lenders who have invested in Government loans. The letter says that on a previous occasion the Wellington Exchange said such a solution of present difficulties should only be applied as the very last resource and out uf d:re necessity, lhe meaning of that was and still is a "necessity" arising after every other source of revenue had been drained to the utmost drop. In the past credit of Lhe Dominion has stood high in money markets and an appeal is made to maintain that h:gh standard. "No matter how we might be pressed and what other Dominions might do," states the letter, "it is submitted with all due respect to members of the Economic Commission that its suggestion as affecting interest payments, if acted upon, will not make for equality of sacrifice. The effect of reduced interest would b e so far-reaching as to embarrass the Dominion for many years and place a stigma for all time on New Zealand. Members of the Exchange are really alarmed at the consequences in the immediate and distant future if the sanctity of national contracts is sacrificed.