811.51603/117: Telegram
The Secretary of State to the Ambassador in China (Johnson)
286. Reference Tsingtao’s despatch no. 302, October 24, 1939,27 in regard to an American bank for Tsingtao. It is not clear from this despatch whether the American Consul made any forthright attempt in his conversation with Mr. Evans to discourage cooperation with the Federal Reserve Bank on the part of any American bank which might be established at Tsingtao.
As the Embassy is aware, it is the current policy of this Government to discourage cooperation by American banks in China with the Federal Reserve Bank and to discourage any action which might be construed as giving support to the Federal Reserve currency and thereby militating against Chinese national currency.
Please communicate the foregoing to the Consul at Tsingtao and instruct that if he is again approached in this matter by American nationals who are either directly or indirectly interested therein he should be careful to assume an attitude along the lines indicated in the preceding paragraph.
Sent to Peiping. Repeated to Chungking.
- Not printed.↩