Richard Kerschagl, Die Regelung der Valutaschulden und Goldschulden in Österreich, Polen und Ungarn (1934)

Richard Kerschagl’s journal article compares how Austria, Poland, and Hungary regulate debts denominated in foreign currency or protected by gold clauses. Its central concern is the distance between contractual protection against depreciation and the payment actually obtainable under national monetary law. Proceeding country by country, Kerschagl distinguishes obligations requiring actual delivery of the stipulated currency or gold from obligations merely measured by their value. He also separates monetary legislation from the law governing contractual obligations. These distinctions reveal why apparently similar clauses produce different outcomes under depreciation, exchange controls, and officially maintained parities.

The Austrian discussion begins with the limits of legislative coverage:

Die Goldklauselgesetzgebung in Österreich hat das Problem der Zahlung innerhalb Österreichs fälliger Gold- und Valutaschulden nur teilweise geregelt.

English translation: Gold-clause legislation in Austria has only partially regulated the problem of paying gold and foreign-currency debts falling due within Austria.

Austria excludes obligations requiring actual delivery from its general settlement. Whereas the legislation largely neutralizes differences in the wording of ordinary gold and currency clauses, excluded obligations leave judges greater scope to interpret contractual intention. Even here, the categories are unstable: commercial law permits formulations equivalent to an express delivery requirement, while judicial interpretation can classify an apparent metallic-payment provision as a gold-value clause instead. Classification therefore determines not merely terminology but the creditor’s substantive protection.

A further asymmetry concerns mortgages. Gold mortgages without corresponding mortgage bonds cannot be revalued before 1 January 1936, whereas foreign-currency mortgages may become eligible immediately when the relevant currency’s statutory reference date is established. More generally, Austria combines phased revaluation of existing obligations with immediate protection for future contracts. Its framework draws on private clearing and exchange rates formed in a comparatively free, though restricted, market. Yet it leaves unresolved the interaction of gold and foreign-currency clauses: when a foreign currency departs from gold, must a gold-denominated claim follow gold value or the depreciated paper currency? Kerschagl connects this question to governing law and contractual intention. An Austrian judgment distinguishes submission to foreign monetary law from submission to foreign obligations law, but supplies no comprehensive settlement.

Poland offers a broader statutory response, expressly including debts payable in actual foreign currency or gold. Its rules also protect creditors against depreciation during a debtor’s delay, including through a choice between the exchange rates at maturity and at payment. At the same time, revaluation becomes an instrument for strengthening domestic currency: mortgages and insurance contracts generally must be denominated in zloty, many institutions face restrictions on foreign-currency credit business, and savings-book deposits must be accepted in zloty without the institutional exemptions allowed elsewhere.

Der Gläubiger nimmt also das Risiko einer gesetzlichen Gleichstellung von Papier und Gold in dem Staate, in dessen Valuta er kontrahiert, auf sich.

English translation: The creditor thus assumes the risk of a statutory equation of paper and gold in the state in whose currency he contracts.

This allocation of risk follows Poland’s general reliance on the monetary law of the currency’s home country. Insurance contracts are an important exception, retaining the old gold parity. Kerschagl stresses that Polish and Austrian legislation respond to opposite monetary circumstances: Austria addresses the schilling’s decline against most foreign currencies, whereas Poland, with a stable zloty, principally accommodates the depreciation of foreign currencies, especially the dollar. Similar legal devices thus serve different economic purposes.

Hungary’s system rests instead on official National Bank quotations. Ordinary foreign-currency debts can be discharged at official rates; for actual-delivery obligations, payment may be postponed. The debtor cannot be compelled to settle in pengő at another rate, but neither can the creditor be compelled to accept pengő at the official rate. Gold legislation adds a nominal safeguard by converting broad classes of existing pengő claims into gold-pengő claims. Subsequent measures permit actual-gold debts to be paid in legal tender while allowing creditors to defer acceptance, with specified rules for interest and later opportunities to reverse that choice.

Praktisch hat sie bisher zu gar nichts geführt, da die Ungarische Nationalbank keine anderen Goldkurse als die offiziellen verlautbart hat und auch das Finanzministerium weiterhin auf dem Standpunkt „Gold = Papier“ steht.

English translation: In practice, it has so far achieved nothing, since the Hungarian National Bank has announced no gold rates other than the official ones, and the Ministry of Finance likewise continues to maintain the position “gold = paper.”

Kerschagl’s criticism exposes the difference between legally constructing gold security and making it economically effective. Hungarian courts nevertheless give combined gold-and-currency clauses a limited protective function: a gold-dollar obligation secures conversion through the old mint parity into gold pengő, though not payment at the actual exchange rate. Creditors retain the option of postponement rather than accepting paper settlement.

The comparison culminates in a monetary-policy argument. Hungary’s definitive settlement depends on recognizing genuine exchange rates in place of official quotations supplemented by differentiated premiums for exporters. Such reform would also disentangle monetary policy from trade policy, a separation Kerschagl regards as already achieved in Austria. The article’s significance lies in showing that debt protection cannot be assessed from contractual wording or statutory gold definitions alone: its practical value depends on exchange-rate institutions, governing-law rules, and the allocation of depreciation risk.