Panic flight from money

protect themselves against an imminent crash.

Earlier this week the a gold rush mentality has Branch managers in Yokohama for three of the four major stock brokers have been arrested on charges of manipulating the sale of vidence or strong sus more than 6 million shares icion that speculation an in Kyodo Feedstuffs Co, nas adult an whose vice-president was also arrested. lumber, soya beans, red In all, five executives of beans used in Japanese the three broking firms— sweets, animal todder, silk Daiwa, Nomura and NikkoNool, cotton, electrical wire were charger. paper for printing, bandages, The three firms between them control a majority of membership rights in private the trading on the Tokyo golf courses (!), the paper stock exchange.

Other firms have received Naturally the staple food, 'warnings' from the Finance rice, has not been over- Ministry. looked by the speculators. There have been wild These are not small-time fluctuations on the stock and operators, but the most important firms in the land. commodity markets.

On February 2, the stock The Minister of Finance market average set a record has twice called the execu- for a single day's fall, only tives of the top companies to shoot up two trading days to beg them to stop the later to a record day's peak.

Trading has fluctuated AT the first meeting with from 100 million shares a companies day to 1,000 million. denied the charge of specu- An index shows that stock prices have doubled in reBut seven days later the lation to profits over the Minister called them into three years to last September. his office again for another Even wilder gyrations have -and equally unsuccessful-- been witnessed on the commodity markets.

Customs officers are now The three Japanese wool investigating the six major exchanges were ordered me to void payment ut trading roman. on cic. to close on March 8 after prices reached levels far ments to avoid payment of beyond what could be explained by a world-wide Evasion of £500,000 in shortage of the commodity. taxes has already been When the markets were closed the prices had risen uninterruptedly by over 300 per cent and the trading volume had gone up tenfold.

Similar developments forced the closure of the silk exchanges.

The panic flight from money has uncovered all manner of sharp practices GET YOUR BOOKS, PERIODICALS AND paperbacks 28 charlotte st eriate 1123 which were previously concealed from view.

The 'Los Angeles Times' comments: 'A new mentality has gripped the nation [sic]. The password now seems to be "anything goes" in business and it has assumed bandwagon proportions.

When the capitalist rats bale out, there's no question of women and children first!

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4 Workers Press,