Business: TIME CLOCK, Sep. 27, 1954

F-100 SUPER SABRE production will be stepped up by North American. It has just received a new order from the Air Force for more than $100 million worth of the supersonic fighters. To meet the demand, North American is tooling up its Columbus, Ohio plant to supplement production at its main plant in Los Angeles.

SHERATON HOTELS purchased working control of New York’s 750-room Astor Hotel from William Zeckendorf’s Webb & Knapp (TIME, Aug. 9) for $1,400,000, thereby added the 30th hotel to its chain.

WEST GERMANY, which has been pressing for currency convertibility, took a big step on its own to free the mark. It unfroze $3 billion worth of blocked marks held by foreigners, made them exchangeable for foreign currencies. But Britain, once leader in the convertibility parade, is now dragging its feet, partly because of Labor’s opposition arid a drop in dollar exports. Though Chancellor of the Exchequer R.A. Butler is on his way to the U.S. to discuss the exchange problem, chances that sterling will be made convertible this winter—as expected a few months ago—are dim.

RUSSIA IS EDGING into foreign markets, apparently for propaganda purposes. Although pressed for steel at home, the Communists are working on a deal with India to build a big (500,000 tons yearly) steel plant, sell it to India on easy terms (2% or 2½%, ten years to pay). Other projects: selling cheap tractors ($877) to the Indian Agriculture Ministry, exporting automobiles (the Pobeda) to Finland and Sweden, building oil pipelines and storage tanks, grain bins and paved roads in Afghanistan.

TITANIUM OUTPUT is going up. Union Carbide and Carbon Corp. will build a $31.5 million titanium plant (the nation’s biggest) at Ashtabula, Ohio, to produce 7,500 tons yearly of high-quality metal (total current U.S. production: about 5,000 tons). To guarantee Union Carbide a market, the U.S. Government signed a five-year contract to buy, at going prices, all titanium not sold to private industry.

ATOMIC POWER PLANT will be built in New England as soon as the U.S. Atomic Energy Commission gives the go-ahead. A group of eleven utilities that sell more than 90% of New England’s electricity have formed the Yankee Atomic Electric Co. to work with the commission on a prototype nuclear energy plant.

FORD’S COMBAT CAR, a smaller, faster, lighter version of the Willys jeep, will soon be put through rigorous field tests. Ford claims its experimental XM151 will cost less than the jeep, but get 30% more miles to the gallon, give a smoother ride.

SINGER SEWING MACHINE is working on a deal to move into Japan by taking over Japanese-owned Pine Sewing Machine Co. Singer wants to modernize and expand Pine, but the Japanese sewing-machine industry, already in a slump, is bringing heavy pressure on the government to keep Singer out.

MACHINE TOOL INDUSTRY will get a $100 million shot in the arm from the Pentagon, which is readying orders for heavy grinders, borers, lathes, etc. to fill its mobilization stockpiles.

PEACE PACT signed by the A.F.L.’s International Association of Machinists and United Brotherhood of Carpenters and Joiners will end a 40-year feud. A.F.L. is also setting up a plan to arbitrate all disputes among its 110 affiliates, thereby try to head off all future jurisdictional walkouts.

EUROPE’S BOND MARKETS are recovering. For the first time, the World Bank placed a dollar bond issue ($50 million, fiveyear, 2½%) completely outside the U.S. Investors in 23 countries oversubscribed it by $28 million.