From a Correspondent, Tokio, Oct. 10.
Japan has had quite a number of earthquakes this year, no less than three' of which were accompanied with a certain amount of damage to life and property, but the quake in economic circles caused by the business depression has been really severe and its effects are being daily revealed. The balance of foreign trade is still adverse to this country, and, although there are signs of a slow improvement, Japan is losing the business she secured during the war chiefly owing to the prevalent high prices and owing to the stiff competition she is facing on all sides, As significant side-lights on the economic situation, it is apparent that capitalists are no longer backing up any ventures that have any element of risk. In other words, the speculation fever that held the country in its grip for the past four years has passed away, and business men, both big and small, are becoming very cautious and conservative. Capitalists are sinking their money in the erection of large, modern-type office buildings, and skyscrapers of the American variety are fast springing up all over the business section, transforming parts of Tokio, Osaka and Kobe into bits of New York or Chicago side by side with diminutive wood-and-paper houses of Cid Japan.
Even this way out of the difficulty has not been productive of very satisfactory results. Many of the large concrete buildings erected have most of their office rooms empty, and at the present time are actually a loss to the owners. The less prominent business houses that a year or so ago housed even their branch firms in some up-to-date structure are now forced to seek unpretentious buildings in some alley or side-street owing to inability to pay the rents they seemed perfectly capable of paying a brief twelvemonth ago. Owners of the larger buildings hesitate to let their rooms or offices owing to the number of defaulters in the matter of rent payments. The Japanese papers report that considerable haggling goes on now when a firm wants to rent a room or an office.
Bankers lead in the construction of large, modern office buildings and in Osaka, the business metropolis of Japan, no less than 11 banks own their own buildings which are of the latest American or European type with all modern facilities. Next to the banks come the newspaper offices, and nearly every one-of the larger Japanese newspapers has erected imposing edifices to house their staff and machinery.
Prices are slowly tobogganing
Text read from the printed page and cleaned; old type leaves the occasional error.