Evening star., 1948-04-04
British Sell
Latin Stock
Dispose of Holdings
to Settle Up
on Debts
By Romon Jiminez

By Roman Jiminez
LONDON.-Britain, long a f1nan-
cier of Latin American development.
has started to sell out her invest
ments there.
With her economy exhausted by
six years of war, she has been forced
to dispose of some of her choicest
pluns in South America. There
is the prospect of others disappear
ing the same way.
London economists point out this
has meant not only the loss of
dividends from hard-currency coun-
tries but also a shrinking of the
market for British industrial prod
ucts - things like British built
streetcars for British -owned rail-
ways. Coincidentally, they said, the
market was opening wider for the
United States.
The British selling trend in Latin
America was started before Second
World War, when Argentina ac-
quired two of the biggest British
capitalized enterprises in Buenos
Aires-the Primitiva Gas Co. and
the Anglo-Argentine Tramway Co.
The tempo quickened after the
war ended, when Latin American
countries pressed to collect the huge
debts Britain had piled up for food
and raw materials.
on Debts
British investments in the South
American continent had dropped
from a peak of 1000 100000 pounds
($4,00O, 900 ,O0O in 1898 to 920, 900 900
pounds ($3,680, ,0O0) in 1945. Cur
rently her investments total ap-
proximately 750o0O,0oo pounds ($3,-
900, 100000.
This war-induced weakness in
Britsin's financial position has
played into the hands of national
lists in Latin America, and especially
in Argentina, in their desire to get
RID of foreign capital.
While the campaign against Brit
ish capital did not reach the Ar
gentine heights In other South
countries, they have been
quietly buying up British companies
and liquidating their foreign debt
in British hands.
A typical example is Uruguay,
which since the war has bought the
British-owned Tramway Co. of
Montevideo, the Montevideo Water
works System and the country's
railways.
All of them were paid for with
part of the 100000 pounds $685.
000,0o0) that Uruguay accumulated
here as a blocked balance during
the war years. But even after those
purchases, there was enough ster-
ling left for Uruguay to buy in the
London market about 100000
pounds ($16,0OO,o0O worth Of her
foreign bond issues.
Since the war, Argentina has paid
$50, ,00o, 900 pounds $500, ,000, ,0oO for
the British railways and 1000, 900
pounds $4,000, ,00O for the Argen-
tine and smithfield packing plant
facilities in Argentina and London.
The United Kingdom has still
many million pounds left invested
in Latin American railways, port
installations, streetcar systems, tex
tile and sugar mills, packing houses,
estates and lumber mills.
Loss in Invisible Trade
But she has to liquidate still more
Of her wartime debts Brazils co.
100000 pounds Of sterling balances
is the outstanding one-and to pay
for the difference between her cur
rent imports from and exports to
Latin America. Railways in Brazil
and Cuba are next on the list OF
prospective sales Of British invest
ments.
No estimate has been made of
the total loss Of invisible revenue
the changed situation has meant
for Britain, but the governments
economic survey for 194S revealed
that the forecast for the first half
Of the year was . net deficit OF
21 900, 900 pounds ($s4,000, ,00O in
invisible trade with the Western
Hemisphere.
British financial sources, while
aware that Latin America still Is,
with some national exceptions, an
market for foreign
capital investments, believe that
their country's present economic
straits will prevent any attempt to
there for some years.