Jan. 6.
TawinG stock of China's trade position with special reference to; many cas the outlook for 1922, the first matter to strike the onlooker at a time like the present is the removal of the deep feeling of pessimism current a year ago. The whole business situation is too large to be dealt with in the course of one article, but taking one specially important branch—piece goods—we see this strongly exemplified. Starting in an atmosphere of gloom, inevitable after the collapse of the previous June, 1921 at the best could but be a year of adjustment in business. It was so all the world over, and the most that could be hoped for was that the process might have advanced sufficiently to enable business to be resumed on a normal footing with the opening of a fresh year. Without question much progress has been made in re-adjustment, but even the most optimistic would hardly sugges that its completion is within sight. Too many of the consequences of the rash speculation carried on up to the middle of 1920 are still outstanding, and while a number will be felt in individual cases for years to come others may well disappear within the next few months. For instance when the census of stocks is issued towards the end of the present month merchants will know to what extent the accumulation of cargo—a proportion of it bankrupt—has been discounted. The general anticipation is that the census will show stocks much below the average, and so far will prove the situation to be considerably alleviated. In making this statement it must be made clear that we refer only to the ''declared'* stocks; what may be still in bond it is impossible to say; but though in some quarters the fear exists that they are possibly heavy, we cannot feel that they are large enough to threaten the stability of the market. So much for that part of the question; as regards the individual consequences of participation in the fictitious trade boom, they are as yet hardly mitigated at all.
The only way in which numbers of local firms engaged in the piece goods business, both foreign and Chinese, have been able to survive the ordeal of the past eighteen months is by the
Text read from the printed page and cleaned; old type leaves the occasional error.