Daily inter mountain. [volume] (Butte, Mont.) 1881-1901, 1900-07-30
FINANCE IN A FOG
LONDON MARKET DEMORALIZED
BY WAR sCAREa
SEE NO END TO DRAIN OF GOLD.
Five Per Cent Bank Discount Coming
.-Slowest Market Since Barring
Failure.

financial correspondent cables: A ground
swell of uneasiness has infiuenced our
one market all week, subsiding sllgnt
toward the end, 1T is true, but not really
disappearing. The fact that business Ia
been driven to the Bank of England be-
cause credit dealers on the outside were
afraid to discount bills ait three per cent,
shows how strong the sentiment OF APP
prehension was. At the end Of the month
we expect generally some little scramble
for money owing to our monthly bank
balance sheet arrangements. but ther rest
~lessness of the market had little to do
with THAT on this occasion. -.
Short credits were fairly cheap always,
never rising to more than so per cent
except on Friday n Saturday, when
stock exchange payments made tenders
occasionally four per cent. Seven
day loans rarely cost more than 81 per
cent and everybody looks for greater
cheapness when the new month comes
in, yet brokers would not discount freely,
sometimes not at all, at four per cent for
the first three days Of the week, and dis
count business accordingly went to the
bank.
This curious display Of cross currents
for the indicates that the bank
has been borrowing money from the
AA~A ~ ~ ~ I'LL uko14 ~
later and desires the market to
strengthen itself. But for the banks &C.
tion credits would have never reached
three per cent and some bill brokers
would certainly AVE worked under four
per cent. That. however. is merely a tenn
porary influence, as the bank must again
release the money 1T gathered in and we
shall be in a more slippery condition than
before.
! Deeper cause of dread in the money
market is found in the demands mad by
the government for money to carry on its
wars. You may not remember the steps
; by which we nave been led into our pres
ent position. Last October s1,OOO, 900. our
chancellor of the e%xchequer told us, was
to see the entire thing through. BY
February 1T became more than twice that
amount, and by the middle of March the
demand had swollen to about G54 900, 900.
Now another Eli, 900, 900 goes on top OF
that, $4,000, 900 of it for China. Not only
has all the wal loan money been spent,
but the government has had to issue
G2,00 900 in treasury bills this week, and
is nearly $4,000, 900 in debt to the Bank OF
England. besides having used up 10 pei
cent of the war loan paid up in full.
w feel in a fog amid all these eak-
ages of capital and new remands, so that
fits of in the market may be
excused especially as 1t will have the
greatest difficulty in finding he money
required. We must recollect that al
these wants of the government are in ad-
dition to the ordinary demands from
municipal corporations all over the King
dom, from our colonies, and from India,
and that quite indefinite possibilities OF
expenditures are Open:ng UP in cOnnec-
tion with China alone.
Hardness in money has lifted continent
'tal exchanges Slightly in our favor, but
we are ne III of danger of raids upor
our small stock of gold, and consequently
we must expect after a little pause to SEE
money again dvanc and a five per cent
bank rate as the next move.
Such possibilities and entanglements
have put an end to all life upon the stock
exchange, and business is smaller thar
since before the Barring crisis, much
smaller if the multiplicity of new securi-
tiles added since then is taken into ac-
count.