THEIR FINANCES.

New Zealand Mail, Issue 1675, 6 April 1904, Page 63

THEIR FINANCES.

It is never easy to tell the available resources of any country, much • less those of a despotic Government-Hike Russia, where publicity is given only to such facts as it is desired should be known. It may he assumed, however, (says the London “Daily Telegraph”), that tire contents of a pamphlet of some 145 pages, entitled “Manuel du Porteur do those of a despotic Government like Russian Ministry of Finance in 1903, are fairly correct. From this pamphlet wo glean that the outstanding "securities 1 , either issued or guaranteed by the State and quoted abroad, are as follow's, divided into three categories:—Government debt proper. £669.000,000; guaranteed railway bonds. £52,000,000 ; guaranteed mortgages of the Bank of Nor bility, £41,000,000: Total, £762,000.000.

The debt charge for 1903 was put in the Budget at 290.966.336 roubles, or about £30:500,000, taking 9J roubles to the £. It did not apparently include the contingent interest on the bonds issued by the railway companies, nor anything for the service of the laiyT mortgage bonds issued by the, Imperial Bank of the Nobility against the hypothecation of the lands of the hereditary nobility. In the Budget estimates for 1904 the ordinary revenue, is stated as £208.000.000. and the ordinary expenditure as £206.400.000. showing in each case a considerable' advance over 1903, the figures for the two years comparing as follows: —Ordinavv revenue (1903) £199.500,000, (1904) £208,000,000; ordinary expenditure (1903) £197,400,000, (1904) £206.400.000: Surplus’(l9o3), £2,100,000, (1904) £1,600,000. It would be rash to suppose that these surpluses can be relied on. As a rule, a wholly different complexion is placed on the national finances by the Extraordinary Budgets—in 1903, for instance, an estimate of over £20,000,000 fqlr extraordinary expenditure really Wrned the apparent surplus into. a. deficit of about £18,000,000. Moreover, since the construction of the SiberianManchurian railway, the lots on the working of the Government railways has steadily increased, the deficit in 1901 amounting to £1,470,000. A very modest amount of the railway bonds is held in England, and indeed the total portion of the Russian debt in the hands of British investors is beiieved to be insignificant. On the other hanii, apart from investment’s in industrial undertakings, it is computed that about £350,000,000 of Russian Government bonds have found a home in France.

As regards Russia’s stock of bullion, wo have not yet the figures for 1903, but while in 1901 she exported gold and silver to tlie ainopmt of £5,736,000 on balance, she imported, about £777,000 on balance in 1902. According to- the official return at the end of 1903 the Imperial Bank ‘of Russia, held £85,772,000 in gold, of which £14,208,000 was in the shape of balances, abroad. The total amount of gold in, Russia which the Government could obtain in an emergency is generally believed to, be about £150,000,000.

At present the outstanding National Debt of Japan amounts to about £55,200,000, of which £36,000,000 represents internal loans, and l , with the exception of about £400,000 which has found its way to Britain, is believed to bo all held in Japan. According to the coupons that are presented for payment in London some £19,000,000 of the debt appears to be held m Britain, though no doubt a small portion, has been taken, by Continental investors. In a report issued in May last, the Acting Japanese Secretary to the British Legation at Toikio) pointed out that the national debt has risen from £24,000,000 ten years ago to the figure given abovei, notwithstanding that- in the meantime the whole of the China indemnity (£37,000,000) had been absorbed into the general finances of the country. The ordinary revenue has, however, increased more than proportionately, having risen from £8,500,000 jn 1893-94 to £22,600,000 in 1903. For the coming year the ordinary revenue is estimated at £22,500,000, and the extraordinary revenue at £2,700,000. making a total of £25,000,000, against which tihe total expenditure) is placed at an equivalent sum, £18,400,000 being reckoned as ordinary and £6,800,000 as extraordinary outlay. A satisfactory feature of -late years has been, the steady accumulation of deposits in the banks and imports of specie. In, 1902 the influx of gold was no less than £3,030.000 on balance, while during the first nine months of 1903 there was a further influx of £1,500,000. The growth of the country’s stock of bullion is, of course, of great importance, and the security of Japan’s system of convertible notes has thereby been much improved. At the'end of 1902 the specie reserve of the Bank of Japan had risen to and it is now stated! to be Besides the reserve of the Bank of Jar

pan, competent authorities assert that the balances upon which the Government could draw amount to> about another £8,000,000, so that the Government has apparently immediately available cash resources of nearly £20,000,000.