* * * COMPARATIVE YIELDS.
When, however, as has been the case during the past week, new long-dated loans of the Trustee order are offered for subscription, it is scarcely surprising that holders of the 5 per cent. War Loan should be speculating as to whether it might not be profitable to sell some portion of the 5 per cent. War stock and-invest in the new issues giving only a slightly lower yield, and with greater prospects of capital appreciation owing to the longer life of the loan. Investors have become so accustomed to looking upon the 5 per cent. War Loan as giving a 5 per cent. yield that, now that the stock is quoted at a considerable premium, it may be well to make somewhat more precise calculations. During the last week, for example, the War Loan has frequently stood at 103, and even if the Loan were to run to its final date of 1947, the yield, allowing for redemption, would be only 41 per cent., whereas, if the average life of the loan were taken at, say, ten years, the yield would be about 4f per cent. As against that yield must be set the fact that the new India Loan, with a minimum life of twenty-nine years, gives, a yield of £4 19s. per cent., or, if redemption at par is allowed for, a yield of over 5 per cent. Or, again, the 3 per cent. Local Loan stock at 651 gives a yield of about 41 per cent.
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