GREAT BRITAIN: Trade Winds

The British, who trade to live, announced significant changes in their trade relations with both East and West:

East. Britian’s Sir David Eccles, President of the Board of Trade, signed a five-year trade agreement in Moscow. Britain’s purchases from the Soviet Union (chiefly timber, grain, furs) should now rise by a third over last year’s $160 million, and may in time reach a level of 2½% of all British imports. Britain refused Moscow’s request for long-term government credit, but expects to sell the Russians “very substantial” amounts of industrial equipment no longer on the West’s strategic embargo list, including complete chemical, plastics and tire plants. The parties also agreed for the first time to exchange $6,000,000 worth of consumer goods annually, including a few token Soviet cars (the Moskvich and the Volga).

West. Britain now has a favorite balance of payments with the U.S. for the first time since 1865 (April exports to the U.S. totaled a record $100.8 million). London accordingly relaxed quota restrictions on dollar imports from the U.S. and Canada, leaving 90% of Britain’s imports from the U.S. free of controls. The change has been expectable since last December, when Britain made the pound more freely convertible into dollars.