The Black Hills union. [volume] (Rapid City, Pennington County, Dakota [S.D.]) 1889-1904, 1896-08-28
A ~sTUPENDoUs COLLAPSE

Chicago Stock Exchange Closed to Prevent
a Panic-TwoB Big Bubbles Burst.
CHICAGO, Aug. 5.-The speculative
deal IN Diamond Match aud New York
Biscuit stock has come to an end. The
Moore Bros. have failed. The great
est speculation aver known IN Chicago
has eliminated in the failure of the
people who were behind the deal.
The Chicago stock exchange ad-
journed at IL o'clock this morning for
an indefinite period. This action was
decided upon at a meeting held last
evening at which were present the
members of the stock exchange, gov
erning committee and 4 number of
prominent capitalists.
The speculative deal Of which the
failure is the elimination is by all
odds the most important in the history
of Chicago stock exchange affairs. It
began early in this year. The stock
of the Diamond Match Cor. pany had
been selling along 1870 for quite a time
ind there had been no special activity
in the market. just prior to the Ven
ezuela incident, the tip had got out In
inside circles hat there were to be
some important European develop
ments IN connection with Diamond
Match affairs and the buying of the
stocks commenced by strong people.
The Venezuelan panic interfered with
the speculation and the stock dropped
during the general decline at that
time to 1i5. From there the rise
started which is the most remarka BILE
In the history OF the exchange.
a strong group of spectators,
headed by John Fl. Moore and Will
lam II. Moore, began buying the
stock. It moved up with scarcely a
halt. The bears occasionally endcav-
ored to interfere with the rise, but
they each time found that there was
both speculative genius and financial
strength behind the market, which
was unlike anything in local specula-
tive affairs. The rise went on for a
considerable time before the general
public had any intimation Of what
vas really behind the advance.
When the decline in stock markets
generally came, following the Demo.
cratic convention, the stock was sell
ing at 224. The values of other Sc
Match was held steadily without so
much as a fractional decline. The
Moores bought the stock with con-
fidence that inspired confidence in
others. The people who had the best
information about the company's
prospects seemed to feel absolutely
certain of the value of the security,
and prices were held through all the
sharp fluctuations in other stocks
fluctuations which carried West Chi
cago to the lowest point in it's history,
and marked startling declines in all
other securities.
Yesterday the stock was held with
hardly q waver at 222, but there was
an ~outpouring of long stock which led
the keen observer of the market to
fear that the load might become too
heavy, and the events later in the
afternoon proved hat those fears were
correct
The deal in Diamond Match was
only part of this great speculative OPP
Grafton. The Moore Bros, had organ
lied the New York Biscuit company
several years ago, after the first great
success of the Diamond Match COM
pany. The panic Of 1898 had hit the
biscuit company severely as it did all
the other industries and the stock was
far below par. The success which
was met with in a speculative manip-
ulation Of Diamond Match led to q
desire to see what could be done with
New York Biscuit and that stock was
taken several months ago and adj
vanced from 20 to lO8.
From that it dropped back to 80, and
for weeks was held close about that
figure, in spite Of the sharp declines in
other securities. Enormous quantities
of this stock were also poured upon
the market, but they were taken with
the same steadiness which marked the
action of Diamond match. The accum-
ulations, however, represented a
great sum in time, and the operations
in the stock will add largely to the
total of the amount involved.
1t is not at the present time possible
to make any estimate of what the
figure is. The Moore's have unques-
tionably purchased an enormous line
of New York Biscuit and Diamond
Match. The high price at which
Match has been selling makes the
sum involved extremely large. The
capital stock of the Diamond Match
Company is ST., 600, 600, and of New
York Biscuit SO, 900, 900.