The daily morning Astorian. [volume] (Astoria, Oregon) 1883-1899, 1899-03-07
LONDON FINANCIERS IN
DREAD on WALL. STREET.
Fears Expressed That IL Is Msneuvering
TO Catch Them Short--stock Market
Subject to Many Worries.

NEW YORK. March 6-The Times
London correspondent cables: The sus-
Picion Is entertained here that Wan
street is maneuverlng TO catch us short.
This may be merely our way OF *.
pressing disappointment that the Janu-
/ ary great rise IN prices has not been sus-
toined. PROFESSIONALLY there are already
"a good many bears in your railroad
shares here, because percentage of
operators always sells on any advance.
I IN the belief that there win be a reac-
iion But stIll think that the bulls
( irr,domlnate, II not In the market itself.
among the amateur operators outside.
q; least, the great bulk OF whom never
take 4 philosophical view OF ups and
downs. An experienced broker remarked
to me only yesterday;
What people begin TO feel is thar AZ
Americans continue to buy their own
railroad shares as they have been doing,
! there will soon be none at all left on this
side, and they regard such a state OF
iatrairs with some apprehension. partly
because they feel sure that these Sc
icurlues would never have been taken
home II the buyers were not convinced
that they must all in time prove to be
valuable investments
This is the usual method OF reasoning
and means that In sort of friendly
envy We shall try to buy back and Keep
a few OF these prospective investment
stocks
We have been bothered though, with
several worries of the nightmare engen-
derIng sort They are partly the conse-
quence of our great imperial position
Not day passes but some scare monger
gets al the market from somewhere
This week 1t has been China and Muscat
| principally, whence various small alarms
have sprung up regarding our relations
with Russia and France. Prices have,
therefore, been disposed to drop, and in
no department have the large supporting
houses done anything to sustain them,
The consequence is that the speculative
position wears and has an overloaded
appearance in places, as II many of the
plungers were oppressed by the mass of
paper they bought madly a month ago.
All this would disappear In live minutes
| II you would only give us some encour-
agement by purchasing more freely and
displaying better bank statements 1t
| is too bad that your associated banks
should be rapidly diminishing their sur
plus reserves just when we had calcu-
lated on seeing them we'll maintained,
and worse still, that treasury deficits
should be dangled like deaths heads be-
fore our eyes by congress.
What much increases the aggravation
is the continued precariousness of our.
own credit position, We, too, have Il
bank which grows weaker instead of
stronger, and a government busy In
landing us IN quite a respectable de-
lhclt The prospect Is, therefore decd-
edly not pleasant, No wonder the mar
kets are left to the small buyer who
still comes in thousands every day In
the week and purchases his five or ten
shares, principally Kafiir or Rhodesian
mines or home industrlals, in the hope
of making pound or two in a rise,
He may If he holds on, but the market
conditions are by no means as assured
as l like TO see them. Not only Is the
bank unable 10 retain any Of the gold
(which is almost daily reaching our
shores, but it keeps losing part of its al