Anxiety in the banking world

of the 14 leading capitalist countries met in Paris yesterday to take final decisions on the monetary crisis be. fore re-opening the foreign exchange markets on Monday.

The meeting was a resumed session of the top-level talks which broke up without substantial agreement a week ago.

Since then the Common Market has announced that the German mark, Danish crown, Dutch guilder and French, Belgian and Luxemburg francs will float jointly against the dollar when the markets reopen.

The EEC delegates opened yesterday's meeting by explaining their plans other participants.

US Treasury Secretary George Schultz then answered EEC questions about American participation in a so-called "international settlement'.

French Finance Minister Valery Giscard d'Estaing, who chaired the conference, claimed after the morning session: 'There has been a large measure of agreement Concorde given the kiss of death by US report CONCORDE, the Anglo-French supersonic jet, is a commercial failure and poses no threat to the US aerospace Industry. accordIng to a US Congressional sub-committee.

The majority finding Bombing threat to North Vietnam NORTH VIETNAM has been threatened with renewed bombing by US President Nixon, who claims it is sending weapons and supplies to the south.

At a Press conference on Thursday Nixon emphasized that he had never hesitated to resort to bombing and other military measures when the North Vietnamese had dragged their feet during the Paris peace talks.

To show he meant business, Nixon stopped the evacuation of American troops from Vietnam. His warnings resembled those Nixon challenges Congress over PRESIDENT Nixon i moving to a showdowr Congress over White House staff called upon to testify before Congressional committees.

The conflict has come to a head over his nomination of Patrick Grey as permanent head of the powerful Federal Bureau of Investigation in succession to the late Edgar J. Hoover.

Grey's conduct of the Watergate affair, which in two members of Presiconcerning the intention of the nations taking part.

But other EEC sources said Schultz had made only slight concessions in agreeing to maintain the dollar's parity against the EEC float.

Sources said EEC. currencies would probably float upwards against the dollar when markets re-opened.

This means that the relations between currencies Will be further disrupted as soon as the markets open and the joint float will immediately be under strain.

So any Paris agreement can only be the most temporary and ramshackle.

The Finance Ministers' deliberations during the record fortnight's closure of foreign exchange markets have been a disastrous failure.

They have been forced to put an end to the last vestiges of the post-war fixed parity system and float almost all the capitalist world's main currencies. At the same time they were unable to agree even within the EEC on joint steps to meet the situation.

But the most damning evidence of their failure is the continued rise in the gold price, now over $82 an ounce on the London market, despite rumours earlier this Democratic Senator Proxmire's 14-man committee 'More than a failure, this plane that was often alleged to end American dominance of civil aircraft manufacturing has debilitated the aerospace industries of our two given before the mining of the North's harbours and the big bombing raids last December. He gave no time limit to his ultimatum.

US reprisals might take the form of bombing supply depots and storage dumps in North Vietnam and attacks on the Ho Chi Minh trail.

Talks on US aid for the reconstruction of North Vietnam opened in Paris and will resume on Monday. Officials made it clear that the prospects for such aid looked poor if the alleged North Vietnamese ceasefire violations continue.

Hanoi has already been White House staff dent's campaign staff were convicted of conspiring to tap Democratic Party telephones during the presidential campaign, has roused deep antagonism.

Nixon said that he did not think responsible Senators would make Grey a hostage by refusing to confirm his appointment because cf the dispute over the Watergate affair. Meanwhile he refuses to allow his staff week that central banks may sell their holdings of metal.

Banking circles know there is no way out of the crisis by international agreement.

Those who put their trust in the rumours of gold sales and in the hope that Washington will come to the rescue are deluding themselves with wishful thinking.

The present crisis can end only one way: with a substantial collapse of credit internationally, bankrupting whole sections of industry and commerce and pricking the inflationary bubble which has grown to such grotesque proportions.

This collapse could well be precipitated by developments in the Euro-currency market, the centre for lending and borrowing of much of the pool of 'hot' dollars and other depreciating paper money.

The Bank of England's Quarterly Bulletin, published last week, shows an ominous rise in the short-term debts of British banks on the Eurocurrency markets.

Its figures show not only a £9,000m increase in British banks' involvement in this market, but also a sharp increase in their short-term indebtedness.

There has been a marked tendency for banks to bormain overseas rivals by devouring resources that might have been used to develop more viable products and has discredited these industries in the eyes of the suppliers of future financing, Including the British and French taxpayers.' promised aid for 1973 from the Soviet Union, China and several East European coun tries.

North Vietnamese daily 'Nhan Dan' accused the US of supplying South Vietnam with arms via Japan through the port of Da Nang. A Foreign Ministry statement attacked US air intrusions and called for scrupulous observance of the Paris peace terms.

In the latest move to improve relations with Nixon has appointed year-old diplomat David Bruce as head of the US liaison office in which is to open in May.

to appear before the mittees.

Nixon is out to increase the powers of the executive branch and render his own large and expanding staff immune to Congressional scrutiny. This is a direct challenge to Congress.

He claimed that if Senate wanted to test ruling by taking it to Supreme Court, he belie ved he would win.

lend for longer terms, often to borrowers who would have been considered bad credit risks in the past.

As the sardonic columnist of the 'Financial Times' put it: Lenders have found themselves pressurized to look for outlets of a less conventional kind than the market has contented itself with in the past.' The Bulletin comments on the increased 'lack of balance in terms of maturities between loans and liabilities'.

This has become so marked that whereas 67 per cent of liabilities outstanding were due to be repaid in less than three months, the proportion of loaned money due to be repaid to the banks in the same period was only 58 per cent.

The key role played by the Euro-currency market and its international ramifications mean that one major collapse could rebound with great rapidity throughout the capitalist world's banking Yet this market is beyond the control of any single capitalist country and has virtually no rules to govern its operations.

The increasing short-term debts of London banks on this market can only increase the danger of a failure which could precipitate the collapse of big sections of the credit Five committee members were against these findings.

Proxmire is a leading campaigner against the provision of government funds for an American supersonic jet, a project which some interests are trying revive.