Australian Finance The financial situation in Australia, although still the
cause of much anxiety, is a little better than last week. The scheme for the repudiation of public debt produced by Mr. Lang has been dismissed by a majority of the Labour Caucus. As for Mr. Theodore's more moderate, but still dangerous, scheme for stabilizing prices by arbitrarily fixing them at the level of two years ago, it has been virtually superseded by the intervention of the Commonwealth Bank: When we wrote last week Mr. Theodore had been compelled to recognize that he could do nothing without the co-operation of the Bank. On Friday, February 13th, the Board of the Bank declared that it would not finance the State Governments any longer unless schemes for a drastic reduction of expendi- ture were adopted. Sir Robert Gibson, the Chairman of the Bank, offered in conjunction with Mr. Theodore to call a conference with the trading banks to discuss re_ trenchment. That is to say, he proposed a triangular Conference representing the Commonwealth Government, the Commonwealth Bank and the trading banks.
