Seven Thousand Tons of Silk

To an end last week came Japan's great attempt to stabilize the silk market in the same manner the U. S. Farm Board has attempted to stabilize grains and cotton. The great Japanese surplus of 108,000 bales (14,144,000 Ib.) which has overhung the world's silk markets for many months was sold to E. Gerli & Co., Manhattan silk commission merchants, for $16,320,000, a sum which will come in handy for the war-worried Japanese Government. The price came to $150 a bale against an open market price of $178 for "crack double extra" (basic grade) silk on the National Raw Silk Exchange. E. Gerli & Co. have a year in which to distribute the silk. They expect to sell about half (the poorer grades) in Japan and the Orient, the better grades in the U. S. and Europe. Because it was understood that henceforth Japan will try to stabilize silk only by urging smaller production and because the visible supply was equal to only a three-month supply, raw silk merchants last week were inclined to be bullish.*

The Gerli-Japan deal brought into prominence the Gerli silk business, largest in its line. The Gerli family was in the silk trade in Italy for years./- In 1883 Emanuel Gerli, present president of the firm, migrated to the U. S. For many years E. Gerli & Co. did a business of about 500 bales a year against its present volume of 150,000.

In 1907 Japan came to the fore in silk. After the Japanese earthquake in 1923, Japanese silk deliveries were stopped for two months. But Gerli & Co. arranged to ship silk from Kobe almost immediately and this was the real opening of a silk market outside of Yokohama. Emanuel Gerli is 73. Active spokesman for the firm in his nephew, Paolino Gerli, 41, a vice president. He came to the U. S. from Italy in 1905, later went to Japan where he dealt in silk for his own account from 1919 to 1921. In 1922 he joined E. Gerli & Co. Although the firm is" primarily a commission house it makes rayon in Italy, and the Gerli family recently assumed control of Belding Heminway, one of the biggest U. S. silk manufacturers. Paolino Gerli is short, very dark, very suave, speaks with a slight accent. He was one of the founders of National Raw Silk Exchange in 1928, and its first president. Silk is not his only interest. He was listed in the roster of stockmarket shorts given out by the Senate fortnight ago.

*Silk is so valuable a commodity that insurance rates on it have been high. Famed in rail-road lore used to be the "crack silk" trains running out of Vancouver; every hour saved meant a saving in insurance. Lately because of low silk and low insurance prices, many a bale has made the leisurely Panama passage.

/-Emperor Justinian I (483-565) induced two Persian monks to steal some silk worm eggs from China. They were transported to Constantinople in hollow canes, laid the foundation for silk-growing in Europe.

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