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If Cuban American were allowed to handle the conversion, they promised to set up a Cuban national currency of 100,000,000 silver pesos. These Promoter Greñas and his bankers said they were ready to furnish at the rate of 5,000,000 a month. Cuba would have 2,500,000 each month as a seigniorage, would pay for the rest by turning over the U. S. and foreign currency captured through Cuba's sizable export balance. With its own currency Cuba could then set up a national bank to furnish Cubans with foreign credit in exchange for their new pesos, pegged to the U. S. dollar. In addition the Bank could furnish Cubans with credit to buy back their land from foreigners, run their businesses, put Cuba on its own financial feet. As a counter-move to Cuban American, the Chase Bank's Morgan took to Havana the draft of a speedily contrived plan whereby the Chase would do for Cuba what Cuban American proposed to do as a bank of issue, thus retaining for the Chase its dominant position. Further to checkmate the Chase, Promoter Greñas had the support of the Asociación National de Acreedores del Estado, organized and fostered by him, composed of some 75,000 native creditors of the Cuban state—chiefly veterans, civil servants, teachers, small bondholders. The Asociación could be counted on to oppose any Chase payoff before their claims were met. At the week's end, the Chase faced a further barrage from North Dakota's Senator Gerald Nye, who was angry because his SEC-authorized committee of Cuban bondholders in the U. S. had not been invited to appear before the new Commission.
Good Neighbor. Looming behind and above this flurry of fiscal planning last week, however, was still the three-year-old man-to-man fight for Cuba, Fulgencio Batista v. Sumner Welles. In Cuba, Mr. Welles had hoped to make a record which would crown his achievements in the Dominican Republic and Honduras and bring about his dream of becoming Under Secretary of State. Last week Fulgencio Batista was still a hard brown obstacle to that dream. To boss Boss Batista, Sumner Welles would apparently have to do just what Franklin Roosevelt promised not to do on Pan American Day: actively intervene in Cuba and thus blot his great Good Neighbor policy.