GOOD STEEL RESULTS
The financial results of two of the leading steel groups in this country do not reflect the recovery in steel production shown in the January and February figures. But they show what it has been possible to achieve during 1938 which, except for its first three months, was a period of recession in the industry. Vickers, the great steel, shipbuilding and armament concern, has increased its net earnings for the year by £47,797 to £1,398,853. This figure is arrived at after pro- viding a, presumably, increased sum for taxation, but it includes an undisclosed sum in respect of dividend and debenture interest on the holding in the Metropolitan- Cammell Carriage and Wagon Company, a concern which is jointly owned by Vickers and Cammell Laird. Beyond this one does not yet know how much this conservative under- taking has thought it wise to retain in its subsidiary under- takings before arriving at the net profit figure. It is, perhaps, sufficient to know that the results have been good enough to justify the directors in paying a final dividend of 6 per cent., bringing the total up to to per cent. as in 1936 and 1937. The Lancashire Steel Corporation, in which the Bank of England holds an important interest through its offshoot, the Securities Management Trust, has already announced the maintenance of its 7 per cent. ordinary dividend. The full accounts now show that the gross earnings of the company and its subsidiaries increased by £51,995 to L855,560. This enables it not only to maintain the same allocations to reserve as in the previous year—£175,000 for depreciation, £25,000 for staff superannuation, and £too,000 to general reserve, but also to set aside £20,000 as protection against the fluctuations in stock values and to add £4,038 to the balance carried for- ward now amounting to £82,109.
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