REPLIES TO CARD AND SCHEDULE INQUIRIES, 421

lishes, to a very large extent, fluctuations of price at which our copper can
be sold for exportation to any port of Europe or Great Britain, and consequently
 has a dominant effect upon the value of copper in this country. This
company at one time opened an office in London, and its representatives applied
 for membership on the London Metal Exchange. There was a hurried
meeting of the governors, and an order in council, so to speak, was passed
which restricted the membership of the Metal Exchange to English citizens,
and ever since that period, which was some 15 years ago, no one can become
a member of the Metal Exchange unless he is an English citizen. There being
no tariff on copper, and large amounts of copper being both imported and exported
 from this country, the markets of the world are on a close parity, varying
 with freight costs. Furthermore, there is a very close community of feeling,
 or was prior to the war, between prominent members of the London Metal
Exchange and prominent metal houses or metal consumers in Germany. The
German consumption was such a large proportion of the total amount of copper
 exported that German buyers had more influence in fixing the value of
copper than the English buyers. It was very evident to this company that
the buyers of Germany at least worked as a unit. They would repeatedly
remain out of the market for weeks at a time and would not accept any offer
made, during which time the American sellers would accumulate such amounts
of copper that they would be obliged to reduce their offers. The German buyer
would wait until the offers were reduced sufficiently and then would come in
again as the unit and buy in very large guantities. This process of buying
at the lowest and refusing to buy at the highest price, which was naturally
stimulated by their very heavy buying at the low price, resulted in the average
price of export copper being considerably lower than the average price at
which the American buyer, who bought more regularly and was more inclined
to buy at the panic high prices, could buy. The result is, so far as the sales
of this country are concerned, and we believe that there is a similar condition
on the part of other sellers of copper for exportation, that the average export
price is considerably lower than the average price obtained from the Amerisan
 consumers. This difference arises entirely from the selection as to the
time of buying, and not from the holding of a price at any one time by this
company to American consumers above that offered to consumers abroad.
‘While this company is, to a considerable extent, or has been, an exporter of
pig ‘lead, this pig lead has been made almost entirely from material imported
and worked in bond, due to the high duty on the importation of lead up to the
time when European prices were very largely influenced by the preparation
for war and seemed to be influenced by the restricted production of Mexico,
Jue to revolutions in that country. It is not possible, therefore, for this company
 to make a comparison of prices between Europe and the United States,
as the two markets are on a radically different basis, due to the tariff. Such
lead, however, as we do export, which, in normal times, amounts to 12,000,000
to 15,000,000 pounds monthly, is sold, even if sold on the Continent of Europe,
at the daily price fixed by the London Metal Exchange.
As is well known, the banking credit effected through acceptances of 90-day
drafts on London has dominated the commerce of the world. In the early
part of the war, when Italy was preparing herself so that she could enter inte
the conflict if she desired, or defend herself if she did not desire, there was
a very large demand for copper in Italy. We sent the representative of this
company to Italy and consigned considerable quantities of copper to the order
of our representative, in order that spot copper might be on the ground to
take advantage of the increased demand in that country. The steamer on
which our representative sailed, and which held a considerable quantity of
the copper of this company, still owned by this company, and not sold, was
held up at Gibraltar, detained there for nearly 10 days, and the entire amount
of copper unloaded at Gibraltar before the American line steamer was permitted
 to proceed to Italian ports. Furthermore, even the passengers aboard
the American steamer were not permitted to land for nearly a week, and
were not permitted to even be transferred to an Italian steamer going forward
 to Italy. When our representative arrived in Italy, he found that every
Italian bank had been instructed from London that if they should draw their
B0 day acceptances on London in favor of any American metal house, their
acceptances would not be acknowledged in London. That move alone made
it absolutely impossible for any American exporting metal house to sell a
pound of copper in Italy, This is an illustration of the power of concentra-