800.51W89 Finland/88
Memorandum by the Assistant Economic Adviser (Livesey) of a Conversation With the Finnish Minister (Aström) on January 8, 1934
The Minister of Finland called to discuss the negotiations for rearrangement of the Finnish debt. He inquired as to the treatment of the Hoover moratorium in the figures submitted to him. On my stating that the scheme would replace both the regular annuities and the Hoover moratorium annuities, he said that he had not so understood and his telegraphic report of Saturday, January 6, to his Government had been wrong in this respect. I went over the figures with him and finally gave him the following text in pencil, having first read it to Mr. Bell18 of the Treasury who approved its substance, not having the figures before him:
“Treasury calculations ignore Hoover moratorium. Starting with principal of $9,000,000 they subtract each year the scheduled principal payment, and after fifth year charge one-eighth percent interest on unpaid principal. This retroactive table shows total principal payments of $571,000 and total interest payments of $64,723.75, leaving unpaid principal of $8,429,000 from which is deducted excess payments actually made of $2,574,096.75. The new principal of $5,854,903.26 would thus replace Hoover annuities as well as original settlement.”
The Minister referred to publicity in the press regarding the negotiations and said that he was refusing all information to the press.
The Minister said he was instructed as part of his presentation of the matter to ask for most-favored-nation treatment for Finland. He readily agreed that it would be unwise to include a most-favored-nation clause in view of the attitude of Congress. He would report this to his Government and suggest that this point should be left to the future.
I called the Minister’s attention to the last paragraph of the aide-mémoire19 explaining that the suggestion was that we work out a detailed “form of agreement” which could be submitted to Congress and which could be signed after Congress had passed an act authorizing its execution. The Minister said he had not understood this and it was important as he was not sure that in spite of all explanations his Government was not expecting an agreement which would be valid when signed on behalf of the President.