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Show BIG TRADE BALANCE. Figures arc at hand showing the foreign for-eign trade of the United States for the fiscal year ended June 30, 19Tb'. The figures for eleven mouths of the year are based on official reports, those for dune being estimated. They show that our total foreign trade amounted to to', 52u, 000,000, exceeding all previous records by many millions. The exports ex-ports were valued at $4,345,000,000 and the imports at $2,180,000,000, leaving a balance of trade in our favor of well over $2,000,000,000. Nothing like it has ever occurred before, even in the United States, the land of big business. busi-ness. Great Britain continues to .be our best customer, and while the figures for the fiscal year have not yet come to hand, the reports for the calendar year liilS show that the United Kingdom was the source of more than one-third of our imports and took nearly one-half of our exports. Owing to the war our exports to the European countries have largely increased, except in the case of Germany and Austria-Hungary. If those markets were open to us the figures fig-ures would reach a stupendous total. As it is the mills and factories of the United States have been running night and day for a long time, trying to catch up with the orders. However, the j rush is over and from this time on we shall ship less munitions of war and army supplies and more of our other products. The British government having ap proved the Paris commercial agreement it is impossible to forecast the effect upon our export trade, so far as tho eutente countries are concerned, but we will doubtless do considerable business with the central powers and the neutral neu-tral nations, no matter what happens, provided we are able to compete in the matter of quality and price and are not at the mercy of foreign shipping companies. com-panies. While the struggle continues we shall enjoy a considerable portion of the trade of the entente allies, for they cannot exclude us without injury in-jury to themselves, and we are becoming becom-ing so strong commercially and financially finan-cially that we may be able to break any trade combination formed against us. It is worthy of note that in commercial commer-cial contracts between Russia and American Amer-ican .business houses payment has generally gen-erally been effected through London. This arrangement is no longer satisfactory, satis-factory, and instead of bolstering up the great English city as the financial center of the world it is now having the opposite effect, and a circular has been issued by the British government requesting that all such sums be transmitted trans-mitted direct to the United States, because be-cause payments through London increase the demand for drafts on New York and decrease tho exchange value of the pound sterling. The. Russian minister of finance accordingly recommended direct di-rect payments between Russia and the United States. This condition may not exist long after the war, but it seems more than probable that New York will divide the honors wdth London hereafter here-after unless the people of this country mix politics and business in such a manner man-ner as to preclude the possibility of our maintaining ourselves in the foreign markets. It is plain sailing just now, and w-e all welcome the big, fat trade balance for the fiscal year just ended. That much, at least, is secure. We have confidence, moreover, that the next balance, bal-ance, even if not so large, will also .be in our favor. |