Lancaster daily intelligencer. [volume] (Lancaster, Pa.) 1864-1928, 1886-12-14
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LANCASTER. DECEMBER u, 1885.
The Pig Iron Market.

The Thomas Iron company is very large
producer Of pig iron, and it has been in
the habit for many years Of announcing to-
wards the close of one year what its prices
would be for the next year /; and the prices
made have generally accurately indicated
the course of the future market for the
metal 80 that the company has come to
be regarded as an authority upon the
course Of prices, and its annual decision
is awaited with great interest. 1t evil
IDENTIFY requires a good deal Of nerve to in
dicate prices for product for the whole of
n coming year, and there are not many,
II any, pig iron makers in the country
that have emulated this boldness of the
Thomas Iron company, which has yet so
far found its profit in it, in the settling eff
feet which its decisions have had on the
market, the steadiness given to its busi.
ness and the distinction and advertise.
ment it has received. This year its
|, vice president, Mr.. r. e.. Clarke, whose
policy has prided it, has manifested
unusual resolution in making its prices,
which was natural enough in the evidently
advancing tendency of the market, the
natural effect of which will be that prices
adapted to the present market will be too
low for the condition towards the end of
the year and the company selling years
product now will be apt to suffer.
The offer of the Thomas company to sell
for the year at An advance of two dollars
upon last years prices, or at a full market
quotation of to-day, shows that it does not
expect very great rise in prices during
the coming year, or that it is at any rate
its desire to avoid any such result. And
there can be no doubt that it would be
very undesirable; al the prices at
which it offers its iron it can be
made at fair profit by all the
furnaces that are now in blast, and
it would not he well if higher prices should
stimulate the putting into blast of the idle
furnaces that have been forced out of busi-
ness by their lack of facility for cheap
production.
In their day, when the product of single
stacks has risen to over three hundred tOl-s
OF pig metal per day, a greater output than
some furnaces make month, it is evident
that the difference in economy of produc-
tion is 30 great that a price yielding fair
proht to the large and fayorably situated
plant will not be cost to the small and
badly located furnaces, which have sur
vived their usefulness, and can only be gal
vanized into temporary life by shortlived
boom In prices that it is not the interest of
the country to experience. No protection
viii protect them, since it is home compe-
tition that hurts them.
There Is no probability, in view of the
immense productive capacity OF modern
plants and the great capital invested in
the business, that pig iron will have a
boom, and it is reasonably certain that it
win not in the future command steadily
much higher prices than are now indi-
Gated for it. A fair profit upon the capital
invested is all that will be needed to secure
all the capital needed for the production of
the pig iron the country needs. The
tendency Of cost is downwards, because of
the increased capacity Of the machinery
that produced the metal and the increased
output of the raw materials that make il.
The Lake Superior regions new ore fields
are bound to have a decided effect in
lowering the price of ores; and the in.
terests of the Eastern steel makers will be
sure at an early date to demand and secure
The free importation of foreign ores.