840.51 Frozen Credits/10568
The Ambassador in Peru (Norweb) to the Secretary of State
[Received June 1.]
Sir: I have the honor to refer to Despatch No. 6771 of May 8, 1943,34 reporting proposed new regulations of the Superintendent of Banks, designed to render more effective the Peruvian control of international financial transactions.
A copy of the new regulations which are contained in Circular No. 329 of the Superintendent of Banks, dated May 24, 1943, together with a translation thereof and of the covering letter from the Ministry of Finance, dated May 24, 1943, are enclosed.35 It will be noted from the covering letter that Circular No. 329 is designed to bring the Peruvian banking controls into closer harmony with the recommendations of the Washington Conference on Systems of Financial and Economic Control. It is of interest to note in the Circular itself that transactions are forbidden with persons included in the “black list.” It is understood from the Superintendent of Banks that this term is meant to refer to the Proclaimed List of Certain Blocked Nationals. It will also be observed in Section (c) of Article 2 that drafts for remittances to foreign countries must be issued to the order of the beneficiary. This provision was included in an effort to avoid the common practice of buying bank drafts payable to the order of the purchaser who can then endorse it to anyone’s order and thereby circumvent the local controls. It is hoped under Article 3 to secure some character of assurance from neutral countries such as Argentina, Switzerland and others that financial transactions effected with those nations will not benefit the Axis.
As reported in a series of despatches, the last being No. 6910 of May 22,34 discussions are presently being carried on with the Swiss representatives [Page 730] in an effort to work out a system of control for that country. It is stated by the Superintendent of Banks that it will be necessary to arrange some system for remittances to Argentina since the volume of transactions with that country is rather large, but that in all probability it will not be necessary to deal with Spain, Portugal and Sweden since the transactions with those countries are insignificant.
It is considered that Chile, Ecuador and other nations that have severed diplomatic relations with the Axis are not included in Article 3, dealing with neutral nations, but in Article 2.
Article 6 of the enclosed Circular vests the Superintendent of Banks with broad powers to stop any financial transaction. This was considered desirable in order to deal with firms who are discovered to be acting as cloaks or otherwise engaging in inimical transactions but are not included in the Proclaimed List.
Respectfully yours,
Counselor for Economic Affairs