New-York tribune. [volume] (New York [N.Y.]) 1866-1924, 1876-05-27
COJJIfERCIIL TIDES,

COMMERCIAL TIDES.
Apparently statistical information ls about
to establish important laws of financial and
commercial science TO all science Imagina
ton is the torch-bearing guide; Investigation
and painsaking Proof come cropping after;
and thus the most daring speculation of the
boldcst thinkers of one century becomes the
accepted theory of the best rcasOners of the
next. But there is still needed the slow dem
onstration of accumulated facts to establish it
as n law Of science in the centuries to come.
So by the abest reasoners it is held that the
greater commercial disasters are in some de-
gree due to causes not affecting one country
only, and are felt throughoutthe civilized world,
not merely by the limited process of exchange,
but as the direct consequence OF forces acting
during certain periods, III the same general
direction, in all civilized countries Commerce,
like the all-cmbracing ocean, has its tides.
/ he inward rush of waters at He'll Gate IL not
caused by Tie strong swell off Newport; both
are results of forces acting all over the globe,
and their concurrence is the expression OF Il
physical lw. For centuries the science of
finance and commerce has been cropping. for
lack of the clear hight of adequate statistical
knowledge. But the great improvement in
statistics of commerce, banking, and trans
portation, within n few years, already begins
to enable the student to make comparisons of
the almost importance.
In Ncw-York every ono knows that trade is
exceedingly dull that the stock market is
nearly devoid of speculation and is settling
toward lower prices, with notable fall in
shares deemed hazardous; that in nearly all
branches Of manufacture there seems to be
that absurd phenomenon, "oyerproduction;
that money il abundant, rates of interest are
low and yet failures are numerous. We take
up The London Economist of May ID and read ::
Dull accounts of trade come from most parts
" of the country; prices continue to fall in the
" iron trade, but are not yet low enough to
stimulate n return of activity in Austria
"and Germany things arc little better,
"ahd Belgium is in II similar pledica-
~mcnt; tho Manchester market still con-
tinues il an unsatisfactory condition; the
"rltcs for discount, although low, have barely
been kept UPS per cent per annum, or a
"shade lower-and money on the Stock Ex-
change remains very plentiful at nominal
rates the latest report of the Controller in
bankruptcy shows an increase of f5,397,-
1000 in liabilities and the returns of our
" foreign trade for April are in one respect
" the most unsatisfactory of any which have
"appcared during the last two years of de-
"pression.n These phrases, gathered from
different pages of The Economist, show that in
London matters are in very much the same
general condition as in NewYork. Not to
weary by quotation, similar phenomena may
be observed in nearly all commercial centcrs.
The British trade returns are peculiarly in
structiye. England, we remember, is the work
shop Of the world. 1t sends but q small pro-
portion of its products to any ono country. and
British trade therefore suffers but little from
disaster confined to any one nation, however
important. But now the falling off in exports
is remarkably uniforms in every article on
/" our LIST says The Economist, without ex-
"ception, there is decrease in value, ranging
Gin most cases from 10 to 80 per cent, and
"still higher in a few instances. 1t is the same
"with the quantities of articles exported, with
the single important exception of coal" Ii
il also observed that this decline is very widely
distributed, France and Belgium only buying
more than during the previous year. Next, let
us turn to the last statistical returns of the trade
Of the German Empire, for the first quarter of
this year There we find remarkable decline
in importations of important articles, and this,
too, when compared with 1875, year of I'M
usually small transactions. Finally, if we in
spect the great barometer of modern commerce,
the clearinghouse returns, we find that the
total transactions at London for the year end
ing April 80 were f5.407, 900, against
fG,013,299,00 600 in the year 1915, de-
crease of fG06,056,000, or more than 10 per
cent. Since the year ending April 80 1873,
transactions had not increased at all until the
last year, in which they declined prior to
1873, they had increased steadily for five
years. 1t is only necessary to add that there
was also large increase in transactions of the
New York Clearing house prior to 1878, and
that since that year there has been great
decline, the latest returns being lower than
those of any of the preceding years of depres-
sion.
All these condolences, and many others
which every student may observe, are not the
effect of chance. Neither has disaster in any
one civilized country, however severe, been
potent enough to produce this widespread
prostration of commerce, extending to nearly
every civilized land, continuing with little
abatement since the failure of European banks
in 1873. Our disaster, more severe than that