Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1930-04-18
Washington Ticker
BY CLINTON COFFIN.
Press Fiuanrial Writ,

A single chart of sufficient size to
picture the truly immense public utility
security holdings of the Electric Bond
g. Share Co. has been prepared by the
Federal Trade Commission, and requires
one-half the space of big Government
conference room for its hanging. The
graph helps to visualize the masses of
figures which the commissions auditors
and experts began to pour into the hear
ingS this week, in the resumption of the
Federal inpiry into public utility hold
ings.
AS the commission has listed UP the
main items, the Electric Bond g. Share
holdings ramify throughout both Amer
lean continents into the West Indies,
with some extensions into Europe and
Asia. There are three claSsifications of
its holdings, by the chart, to discrini-
nate between the enterprises which 1t
wholly controls, those in which its hold
ings are dominant and those in which
it has simple investments. The Ameri-
can & Foreign Power Co., perhaps now
its main subsidiary, is. a wholly owned
affair whose subsidiaries in turn furnish
light and power to literally scores of
South American and West Indian cities.
In the United States the National Power
e. Light Co., 40 per cent owned by Bond
e. Share; the American Power & Light.
10 pei CCllb OWlCO4 dlld tAAC IsiCSGll ~
Power g. Light Co., % per cent owned.
are among the principal enterprises
enumerated. Each one. of these in turn,
controls the supply Of electrical energy
to far-flung chains of consuming cities
and towns.
Several more days are to be consumed
by the mere description of the structure
that has been built up through the last
two decades. The inquiry as to the
practices of the enterprise can then be
pushed.
Stringent increases in the Australian
tariff schedules, now being put into eff
feet by that country to the discomfort
of American exporters of automobiles
and all manufactured articles, is viewed
by G. F. Baldwin, an American trade
commissioner, just returned from sta
ton at Sidney, as an attempt to restore
that country's economic balance. Aus
tralian local and federal governments
have been for years heavy borrowers on
world money markets, while the Aus
tralian public has Enthusiastically
maintained heavy consumption of i'm
ported goods The net result has been
the gradual piling up of unfavorable in
ternational balance, which a Labor gov
eminent is trying to reduce by some
thing like an embargo on further i'm
ports.
There is no question but that the
country is faced with a difficult situa-
ton" Mr. Baldwin commented. after
filing his reports with the Commerce
Department, "and that it has had to
take radical steps to keep up the pur-
chasing power of its currency. The
proceeding is similar in some respects
to that which the United States went
through in 1922 in debating prices
and currency. All exporters to Australia
will have to face reductions of bust
ness: yet American products will retain
their competitive position. Finally, II
the emergency policies work out as ex-
pected, there will be an enhanced pros
perity in Australia and an ultimate In
crease in its buying power"
Australia, though it has but 100000
people, has imported as much as $780,
900, 900 worth of goods in year, which
works out to per capita consumption
of foreign products much greater than
that of the United States The new
tariff schedule Is aimed directly at re-
duction of this trade figure.