DEPRECIATED YEN

Taranaki Daily News, 2 December 1933, Page 12 (Supplement)

DEPRECIATED YEN

BRITISH TRADE INTERESTS. A NOTE OF WARNING. London, Nov. 23. ; An article in the Financial News says it is strange that the depreciation of the dollar has provided large headlines in every newspaper, whereas the depreciation of the yen by half as much again ■ has passed almost without comment, although it more widely affects British trading interests. “If Japan’s working population in the next 35 years increases from 36 to 53 millions, compelling further development of the export trade, Britain will be faced with the possibility />f a conflict of the rival hegemonies, with Australia, New Zealand, India and Malaya, on the one side, and Japan, Manchukuo and China on the other,” ■ the article proceeds. “Japan intends to use her army as an instrument of trade policy. Military expenditure, entailing Badger deficits, will be regarded as a capital investment. “But Japan, desiring to play in the East the role Britain played in the West, has started a century late. AU the places in the sun are Occupied. Moreover, bayonets are bad commercial travellers. Currency depreciation invokes an inexorable nemesis. u “Nevertheless, the main problem wiU outlast the temporary Japanese setback, resulting in the question whether the Frankenstein Britain created when she assisted Japan to develop will triumph, or Britain wiU be able, before it is too late, to secure a. division of markets with Japan.”