Evening times-Republican. [volume] (Marshalltown, Iowa) 1890-1923, 1899-09-22
Market Gossip.

Market GOSSIP.
Chicago, Sept 22.-Lyons estimated
receipts for today are: Wheat, go cars;
corn. $50 cars; oats, 300 cars. Hog es-
Inmates, 81 900 head.
Wheat people We're trying to figure
last night on the curb where the Bar
rett- Farnum money had gone to. The
big selling of wheat by the firm was on
Monday and Tuesday, possibly 5000. 600
bushels on those two days; and yet the
lowest price for December at any time
was 7014c, so that If the firm did its
selling at the very bottom the market
was not over 112c against it yesterday
morning, when it failed to respond to
margins. Even after the news of the
collapse was out the December got only
to T3c. which was less than Sc above the
bottom price for the week. and it was
not to be assumed that the firm had
done all its selling at the very lowest
price. With such a narrow range OF
prices even the firms enormous selling
gave no explanation of any great loss
es. 1t was taken for granted that the
concern had gotten short pretty nearly
100000 bushels of December wheat.
People on the curb last night thought
they We're able to find where the con-
cern had been short at least 100000
bushels. AT the opening yesterday
morning it was short 100000 bushels to
one ground floor firm, consequently 1t
was not considered by those last night
who We're trying to decipher the cause
of the failure extravagant to put
its shortage at somewhere from 100000
bushels to 10,0oo,000 bushels. But even
on that vast amount the market quo
tations did not show where the firm
lcould have lost above ~ cent bushel.
which would make an even 100000
| bushel of wheat only s150,000. 1t has al
ways been assumed that the firm was
worth more than that, and consequent
lily If II had an adequate capital Monday
morning even its big short selling did
not show where its money could have
gone to. There was some talk that they
ihad bad losses in flax. Very little flax
seed was closed yesterday for the ac-
count of whom 1t may concern" less
| than 100000 bushels. The loss on that
Iamount would not go very far in ex-
planning the failure. There We're those
who thought, however, that the firm
had been wrong on flax seed for some
| time and that, while it did not have
much seed open when the failure came.
a good deal of its money had been fritz
tered away in the past few weeks over
in the little seed crowd which is east of
the wheat pit where the Dick
insons rule and where the short
seller of late has had no COM
| fort An astonishing feature of the
failure was the narrowness of the f1uc-
tuations after its announcement, in
view of the fact that from 100000 to
100000 bushels of wheat were
openly covered for the account
of the insolvent firm. The
December wheat did not get below II &c
nor above Is, a range of only 114c, and
the last price. 717ac, was only sc to &c
over the last figure of Wednesday,. That
there We're no wider fluctuations than
these shows that the commission peo-
pie who had made losses by Barrett
| Farnum kept their heads. Only the lit
i tile people showed any nervousness. The
great houses with the big lines, when
they heard of the failure, decided tc
stand until the Juror was over and
until their purchases could be made or
u normal market. One ground hool
firm, with 100000 bushels coming from
Barrett, waited an hour before doing
any of its purchasing. getting all its
wheat back at under re, or only frac.
tion over the close of the night before
Il Others with big lines followed this same
course. There was another explanation
I however, of the amount Of wheat fol
sale after the news of the failure wa,
out Some people evidently had a tip OF
the trouble. There had been a vas
amount of buying of calls Wednesda.
night. There was great deal of whea
bought early yesterday morning on TIN
curb before the market opened and tw'
! hours before there was any announce
ment Of the Barrett-Farnum trouble.