The Soviet Union demanded copies of the engraving plates, ink, and associated equipment in early 1944, and on 14 April 1944 Henry Morgenthau and Harry Dexter White of the U.S. Treasury Department authorized the immediate air transfer of these to the USSR. Using a printing plant in occupied Leipzig, the Soviet authorities printed large runs of occupation marks. Since these were convertible to U.S. dollars at a rate of 10:1, the exercise financed the Soviet occupation while causing inflation and financial instability. An investigation by the United States Congress (Occupation Currency Transactions Hearings before the Committee on Appropriations, Armed Services and Banking and Currency, U.S. Senate, 1947) found that about $380,000,000 "more currency than there were appropriations for" had been circulated.