The Wheeling daily intelligencer. [volume] (Wheeling, W. Va.) 1865-1903, 1900-02-07
FINANCE AND TRApE.
The Features Of the Money and Stock
Markets.


NEW YORK, Feb. G.-Close: Money
on call easy at 292M per cent; last loan
2 per cent Prime mercantile paper "a
per cent, Sterling exchange easier,
with actual business in bankers bills
at 81 sTli for demand and at 81 san for
sixty days; posted rates 81 So and
81 sslS. Commercial bills 81 S31a94 81.
Bar silver 59Tc, Mexican dollars 47Mc.
Silver certificates 5Slk959hc.
Government bonds strong.
State bonds weak
Railroad bonds strong.
The stock market retained It's general
characteristics to-day OF strength and
breadth. A large outside interest was
manifest and the professional operators
who bought at the lower level were
busy In bidding up the prices Of their
holdings and in feeding the new de-
mand TO take their profits; but while
selling stocks from the one hand to re-
aIize on the rise they were taking on
new holdings OF different stocks with
the other. Apparently the confidence
that stocks which have not yet shared
in the advance could be induced to
move upward was unimpaired and the
holdings Of the large financial interests
which have taken hold OF the market
were broadened and extended. The
duration OF this kind Of upward move
ment does not always depend strictly
on the continuance OF the public de-
mand for stocks, There is constant
process OF unloading by compact and
well organized financial interests into
the hands Of scattered and unskllled
SPECTATORS who have not the same eN-
perlence and Rdroltness In protecting
their holdings, nor the same resources
for maintaining them. The progress OF
bull movement almost inevitably re-
suits In the transfer Of holdings from
strong to weak hands and leaves the
market vulnerable to attack by bear
operators who are able TO force selling
by offering down prices and uncoverlng
margins. Even to-day. attempts by
bear operators were In evidence to force
decreases, but the general demand for
stocks continued 50 good and the large
holdings are still in such strong hands
that the market resisted bear assaults
and presented hard and unyleldlng
surface, even at points where realizing
was going on. Yesterdays strength in
National Steel gave way TO realizing to-
day and the metal group OF stocks was
without any conspicuous leadership.
Norfolk & Western was also sold 70
take profits all day, after an opening
rise Of point, but refused to yield be-
low last nights level Tennessee Coal
wns forced down ut one time 3N points.
The bears conferred their attack on Su-
gar and had that stock down at one
lime TO 1881.
Rumors that the refnerIes were to
shut down and over production to be
worked on at loss figured In the ma
nipulatlon. But in the meantime aR-
gresslVe buying movements developed
In the trunk lines, led by Pennsylvania.
in the cOalers led by Reading first pre-
ferred on the deciBlon to pay dividend
and in the granEeTs and westerns led
By 81 Paul and Atchison. both common
and preferred. The Baltimore G 0hioB,
also after n pause Of a day to digest
profit taklngs, renewed the advance.
The progress towards extension Of hold
lngs by the great railroad systems Of
lesser and competing systems had
much to do with the strength Of Pcnn-
Bylvania and other lines supposed to be
In process Of absorption. The coming
advance In the TIdewhteT freight rates
on bitumlnouB coal was also nm ele-
ment. In the outside market thee wns
an advance Of over thirty points to 345