The Waterbury Democrat., 1941-05-16

money IS put Ii pank ana leIt there till something else freezes over.
 In the first place. these assets aren't all money. They may be stocks and bonds, or they may be real property like apartment houses, or they may be businesses like drug or optical goods manufacturing eS- tabliahmentS, or importing houses or agencies for the wholesaling Of French perfumes or Yugoslavian opium. The point is that all these assets don't have to be converted into cash and the cash stuck of in a safety deposit vault.
 BUSINESS
 AS USUAL
 All these businesses are allowed to carry on pretty much as usual. If they make Q profit on their op- erations. that's all right too. The only restrictions are that the profits or proceeds can't be sent back to the occupied country where they might be seized for the benefit of the NaZis.
 The U. s. Treasury doesn't at- tempt to run these businesses, either. The Treasury has enough headaches of It's own and you wouldn't call this foreign-owned property control an aspirin. Man. agement of frozen assets is left where 1t was before the freezing took place. subject only to licens- ing and control of the Treasury regulations. In this respect, the freezing differs entirely from the work of the Alien Property Gus todlan in the last war when phys teal control and management were taken on all enemy assets
 The present Treasury control costs the owners of the assets nothing. It will cost the Treasury nearly @ million to axcercise this control In tho next year, but the government considers this money well spent as 1t prevents the dumping of these assets on U. s, markets and as 1t prevents these assets from falling Into the hands of Germany through NaSi pres. sure on residents of the occupied countries.
 An interesting contrast, not e parallel to this situation, is the case of what has happened to American capital in Germany. U. s. nationals own about $200 million assets in Germany, $50 million more than Germans own here. Ford, General Motors, Sing CT Sewing Machine, Woolworth, International Telephone &. Tele- graph. Electric Bond and Share and Union Carbide are some of the biggest. Of course, those firms haven't been able to get 6 dime out of Germany since Hitler In most cases, the plants are un- doubtedly at work on German war orders today through outright plant seizure.
 1 SMALL FRY
 EXEMPTED
 When the assets of any nation are frozen !n the United States, what happens first Is that word goes from the Treasury Foreign Funds Control office, under Assist ant Secretary John W. Pehle, to the 12 Federal Reserve. Banks. These banks, brokers, agents and others dealing in foreign exchanges that assets of these foreign nationals must be scheduled with the Fed- eral Reserve Bank within 30 days, Owners of assets less than $250 are exempted as are the foreign ila- tionalS who arc resident and dom iciled In the United States.
 All others, however, are licensed for 00-day. renewable periods to carry on their business, spending so much money @ month in the several categories conforming to the type of business they had been doing. Reports must then be filed to show how the money was actu- ally spent.
 Efforts have been made to re- duce as much as possible the red tape. All these negotiations are necessarily complicated, but as the activities in foreign funds control progressed, 1t became apparent that there were number of standardized transactions which could be adequately controlled by general licenses.
 It is a tremendous job, this freezing of assets. Starting with a small force in the Treasury, the foreign funds control force has grown to over l60 in Washington. For offices 1t has taken over a whole floor in the big Raleigh hotel with an option on space In two more floors.
 No wonder it's hard to get a room in Washington these days.