Matters Financial

In pre-war days 87 pfennigs would buy an Austrian crown, to-day it takes more than a mark to buy a crown. This is not so simple when it is remembered that the mark stands at roughly 80,000 to the dollar and the crown at about 70,000. Accordingly it takes only $12.72 to become a millionaire in German marks and $14.12 in Austrian crowns. (Figures according to the current rate of exchange.)

It is announced in Berlin that the Government intends to issue 210,000,000,000 marks of aluminum coins. At present there are some 200 mark coins in circulation, but with the new issue 500 and 1,000 mark coins will appear. Before the war the only coins in circulation were one and two pfennig copper coins, 5, 10 and 25 pfennig nickel pieces and 10 and 20 mark gold pieces.

A budget showing a deficit of $12,400 billion marks was adopted by the Reichstag. This is terrible on the face of it, but in real money it is only about 12 million dollars.