GOOD DEMAND FOR TOP WOOL ON BRADFORD

Otago Daily Times, Issue 26982, 18 January 1949, Page 5

GOOD DEMAND FOR TOP WOOL ON BRADFORD

NZPA Special Correspondent Rec. 9 p.m. LONDON, Jan. 17. The Bradford top market is further against the buyer following the exceptionally strong sale of top wool in Liverpool and the dominion wool sales, which maintain prices relatively higher than those yet made for tops in Bradford, states the International Wool Secretariat special news service. With the Australian, New Zealand, and South African markets all in full swing, wool values are having a thorough test, and importers here are impressed with the way in which values are maintained. Diminished Russian competition seems to be more than balanced by increased operations by Japan and Australian local mills in the Commonwealth market, but buyers here are chiefly impressed by the extent of their own unfilled needs. Consumers still show resistance to tops and yarns at to-day’s prices, and these have yet to be consolidated'in the selling prices for cloth. This takes months to accomplish, but certain modest progress has been made in adjusting the selling prices of the final products. Lord Bamby. Controller of Wool Supplies during World War I, has given a warning that, although wool prices are not high in comparison with other natural textile fibres, they may stimulate the increased use of synthetics either by way of substitution or complementary use. Meanwhile, the top wool appetite here is so considerable that the next London wool sales will extend over four weeks for the first time in many years, and the Joint Organisation alone will offer 100,000 bales from its stocks. Britain’s current rate of wool consumption appears substantially to exceed the current rate of importation from the dominion markets, and there is a strong call for top wool, some of which is passing through Yorkshire machinery within a few days of it being knocked down at auction. To-day’s top auotations for early delivery are.' 70’s, super. 130 d: 70’s, average, 125 d; 64’s. “A.” 120 d; 64’s, “B,” 116 d; 60’s, super. 103 d: 58’s, 83d; 56’s, 70d; 50’s. 48d: 48’s, 46d: 46’s. 44d.