The Dalles times-mountaineer. [volume] (The Dalles, Or.) 1882-1904, 1896-02-15
THE GREAT MONEY CENTER

Many wonder why it is that Wall
street has become the great money
center of America and why all the big
financial deals are consummated there:
why it is the few bankers who are CEN
tered on that street are able to dictate
to the money markets of the rest OF the
country: and why no deal of any mag
nitude can be effected without their
sanction. The New York Tribune
gives this explanation of the causes
that make such state possible:
.Wall street is nothing but lend
ing shop for the money of the conti-
nent. If nobody sent money here to
be loaned, in order to get safer
business than he could get at home,
Wall street exchanges would shut
up and Wall street banks would get
out of business.
"More than half the loans made by
all National banks in New York are in
fact, made by them only as agents for
various country banks. Out OF 1884,
OOC, 900 loaned, according to quarter
" statement, s2O6, 10000 was due to
other National banks. The money Is
sent here to be loaned because the
New York banks have the confidence
of their correspondents all over the
country, are known to be conservative
and prudent, and in better position
to forsee trouble than bankers any
where else, and have larger opportlni-
ties to make safe loans than can be
found anywhere else. Your crazy
wildcat borrower, whether in Florida
or Oregon, gets his loan at home it he
can, while the man who has something
solid to justify a loan goes straight to
Wall street, because there he can get
money cheaper than anywhere else on
such property. Men are not fools for
sending their money here. 1t is
handled more safely in the long run,
and with less percentage of loss, than
anywhere else in the country, and for
that very reason at lower rates OF in
terest. Whatever they feel willing to
risk on various shady ventures bank
ers elsewhere risk at home, but the
money they put into Wall street they
count as their surest reserve.
1.-The money comes here because
caution and conservatism usually con-
troll the financial institutions Of New
York. Sitting always in front Of meas
ureless disaster, if Berlin or Paris or
London, South Africa or Turkey,
Washington or Albany, make mischief,
the great managers OF institutions
here are forced to keep their eyes con-
stantly open to all sorts of possibilities.
They compete with each other SO
sharply, when there is any chance to
lend or invest with safety, that they
crowd down as far as possible the lend
ing rate for the whole continent, and
that they could not do, if the west and
south were not all the time trusting
over S2O0,000,000 to their Judgment,
and wide knowledge, be-
cause the money is safer here, although
it actually earns less, than it would be
anywhere else. Through their loans
the most important productive indus
tries of all western and southern states
have been developed. Through their
loans the railroads, which have more |
than doubled the value OF land in all |
western and southern states, have
been constructed and maintained. |
Stock spectators, grain and cotton
speculators, exist in New York as in |
other cities, but they are not the men |
to whom the whole nation intrusts its |
last reserve. Wall street is trusted |
because it is trustworthy, and makes
money only because it performs for the
whole nation service more safely, |
,heaply and profitable than anyone
else could perform it,