COMMERCIAL SUMMARY

Otago Witness, Issue 3611, 29 May 1923, Page 21

COMMERCIAL SUMMARY

FIRMER TENDENCY ALL ROUND. LONDON, May 26. V le apple market is steady, with buyers active. Arrivals are clearing well, good varieties fetching- satisfactory prices, espec-i----ally in northern markets, and particularly iu IJiilJ, which has the advantage of a keen demand from Continental buyers. The quality of the apples now arriving is genelally satisfactory. They are ripe and of good colour, and mostly carried well. One or two cargoes were rather heated The | future course of the market will largely i depend on soft fruits. Already large quan- j titles of French cherries are arriving, be inn- | retailed at 6d and 8d a pound, about the I sarn e price as apples. English soft fruits are likely to be retarded owing to the ! prevalence of c-old weather, but on the I other hand the market is being glutted j with a heavy arrival of oranges, many of : which are selling wholesale at 12= to 14s ! per 300. Butter shows no improvement, and with Danish production heavy arid with shippers begging for orders there is little hope of any increase in activity in colonial supplies. Buyers have undoubtedly lost heavily during the recent fall and are now showing extreme care, buying only sufficient for their daily' requirements. Good trade is passing in currants, but here again Australian are somewhat restricted, as 71s is asked for three crowns, the same price as the best vostizzas. Although frozen meat prices show some slight improvement from the terribly lovsrates recently ruling the trade is still far from good, and Australian mutton moves very slowly. This week’s advance is attributed to reports of smaller quantities available for export from Australia and to the possibility of 40,000 sheep being reshipped to the commonwealth, although the removal of this quantity from our market cannot be regarded as of much importance considering that imports from all sources during the first fortnight in May comprised .458,000 sheep and 583,000 lambs. The beef market has been depressed by heavy arrivals of South American chilled, which has been selling so cheaply as almost to stop business in frozen beef. Fortunately there is little Australian or New Zealand on the spot. The beef market is very sensitive nowadays, and the news that a large cargo of Argentine chilled has been damaged by a steamer running aground at I.as Palmas has caused the price of South American chilled to jump three-halfpence a pound.