Post-war monetary requirements of foreign countries resulted in the underwriting of loans aggregating $1,001,385,000 in this country since the signing of the armistice. The largest single piece of foreign financing in that period was the British government 10-year convertible 514 per cent issue of $148,379,000. The next in size was an issue of $101,620,000 3-year 5½ per cent notes, also by the United Kingdom.
Up to the end of 1920 the total investment by the American people in foreign governmental, state and municipal external bonds was about $1,800,000,000. At the end of 1916 the total was about $1,750,000,000. Many of the bonds that were outstanding at the end of 1916 were paid between that time and the end of 1920.
Unfunded Foreign Obligations
Dr. B. M. Anderson, Jr., in the Chase Economic Bulletin, No. 1, estimated that the unfunded debt of Europe to the United States had grown from Jan. 1, 1919, to Sept. 15, 1920, by the amount of $3,772,000,000. On Jan. 1, 1919, Europe appears to have been a creditor to the extent of perhaps as much as $200,000,000 on current items. This had been swamped and by Sept. 15, 1920, a net unfunded debt of something over $3,500,000,000 had been created.
The greatest part of this unfunded debt of Europe has been piled up since the middle of 1919, as the American Government had practically ceased making advances for financing export trade by that time. Since the middle of 1919, virtually the whole export balance has gone on open account and so has contributed to the unfunded debt. Long time loans made by private investors in America to Europe to aid exports
