FINANCE AND INVESTMENT
WHATEVER one may feel about this latest manifestation of Nazi methods, one cannot do less than admire the brave resistance which markets have put up to this unexpected attack by their old enemy, European politics. Not many weeks ago the sort of news which has just emerged from Czecho-Slovakia would have struck terror into Throgmorton Street, jobbers would have lowered and widened quotations and sterling would have been heavily pressed for sale against purchases of dollars All that has happened this week is that the recovery movement has been halted, intending buyers naturally preferring to hold off until the horizon is clearer, while sterling has encountered only a very modest volume of sales. Here is proof enough that the morale of the City is genuinely stronger and that stock-markets, despite the swift advance of recent weeks, are in healthy condition.
Unless the Czecho-Slovak coup is followed by serious complications, I feel that the City will continue to take a hopeful view both of politics and trade. After all—so the argument runs—Britain's vital interests are not affected, and the signs of a recovery in trade are more convincing every day. Railway-traffics, although still below last year's level, are beginning to look really encouraging ; there are unmistakable evidences of a re-awakening demand in the steel, tinplate and textile industries, and the January figures of new private car registrations leave no room for doubt that the motor trade has turned the corner. So all that is now required is a genuine pick-up in business in the United States to provide the final ingredient for a big recovery in markets. I will not quarrel with this argument. Few will dispute that it is sound enough, and should work out according to the " bulls' " estimates provided European politics give it a sporting chance. But will they?
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