FINANCE AND CREDITS 305 
can gold is in demand. By taking ad 
vantage of these conditions much money 
can be saved in the course of a long trip. 
The opening of American banks in Latin 
America will do much toward making the 
dollar popular and travelers are advised to 
take out letters of credit through United States 
banks with local branches in these lands. 
It has been the understood custom for the 
correspondent banking house on whom a letter 
of credit was drawn to give the holder all in 
formation desired as to the rating and financial 
standing of local merchants and to aid him in 
every way possible. This was done in theory 
more than in practice. Assuming that your 
letter of credit was on an English bank in 
Buenos Aires, and that you were selling cot 
ton goods, it would be most natural for the 
bank manager in Argentine to evade all direct 
information as to a possible customer’s stand 
ing, especially if his home institution had been 
discounting bills for a good client in England 
drawn against the local merchant. This is 
generally the attitude of bank managers in