The ‘Group of Five’ adjourned without an accord.

Top economic officials of five major industrial nations met in Washington in an attempt to smooth differences on interest rates and exchange rates. After conferring for nearly seven hours at the Treasury Department, however, ministers of the so-called Group of Five announced no new agreements. Recent months have seen acrimonious exchanges between the five major trading partners composing G-5: Britain, France, Japan, the United States and West Germany. The United States has been pressing the other countries to realign their interest rate and exchange rate policies to stimulate their economies and increase demand for U.S. goods.