158 AUSTRALIAN BALANCE OF INTERNATIONAL
payable on private capital, and this appears in the following
table:

Tare XXXVI
Interest on Capital, Privately Invested in Australia

1901
1902
1903
1904
1905
1906
1907
1908
1909
1910
1911
1912
[1913

Year.

Estimated
amount!
£m.

Estimated
average
refurn
per cent.

125
125
126
128
131
‘34
36
37
140 .
42 4-9
145 54
148 | 52
150 50

Total
Interest
payable.
£m.

5-500
5-000
4-410
5-376
5-764
6-298
6-480
5-838
6-720
6-958
7-830
6-696
7-500

From the data already accumulated it is now possible to
compute the total interest payable abroad, which is given in
the appropriate column in the balance of indebtedness. These
payments for interest on capital invested privately in Australia
are not offset to any extent by Australian capital invested
abroad. Although there is reason to believe that the movement
in this respect is now considerable, for the period under discussion
 it was relatively small. The chief item was constituted
by the excess of income from overseas over expenditure in
obtaining it by the life assurance societies. The credit on this
account rose from about a quarter of a million pounds in the
early part of the period; to about half a million in the later years.
This was taken to be at least half of the total payments credited
to Australia from overseas.
IV. Non-Commercial Items.
There are certain other movements of goods and capital into
! The Private Debt of Australia in 1915 was estimated by the Commonwealth
Statistician (Mr. C. H. Wickens) to be £150 millions, and this would appear to be
en vative. See the preface to the Report on the War Census of the Common.