Writing to his superior on New Year's Eve, 1958, the deputy secretary-general of the OEEC ‘Flint’ Cahan reflected:

Even a cursory look at the OEEC's record would have led an observer to the conclusion that it had been one of considerable attainment. The introduction, in December 1958, of non-resident convertibility represented the fulfilment of a goal set over a decade earlier. This permitted the dissolution of the discriminatory, soft, automatic credit regime of the European Payments Union and the belated operation of the Bretton Woods agreement. Simultaneously, however, the OEEC lost one of its main functions, which had been management of the European payments system. The other major achievement of December 1958 was the decision by France to abolish quotas on 90 per cent of its private trade. France had been in breach of the Liberalisation Code for several years and the announcement meant that, under the auspices of the OEEC, all the major trading nations in Europe virtually abolished quotas on their mutual trade. This success, however, also raised questions about the future of the trade liberalisation scheme, the other major prop of the organisation's activities. Should the OEEC respond by concentrating on the total elimination of quotas on intra-European trade and, if not, what else should it be doing?

In December 1958 one could argue that the intra-European trade and payments schemes, introduced initially to solve the dollar deficit, had been too successful. Quota discrimination against the USA was still widespread at a time when the outfl ow of dollars was becoming a source of deep concern for the American administration. If the European payments position no longer justified regional discrimination, if intra-European trade discrimination ceased to be a part of the solution and became part of the problem of international disequilibria, and if international forums in the shape of the IMF and the GATT already existed for dealing with these issues, was it not time to contemplate a change in the OEEC's character?