The Birmingham age-herald., 1903-08-06
HOUR OF CLOSING
 IS VERY WELCOME
Day of Excitement and Alarm
 in Wall Street
TWO FAILURES ANNOUNCED
General Closing Out of Collateral Re suits in Generalization of Stock Market and Violent De-
 eIines in Securities.

New York, August 1.-The hour for clos Ing of todaysN stock market was hailed with relief by the highly strung up mem hers of the exchange. The day was one of excitement and alarm and the fading away of the prices of securities was so rapid and comprehensive as to arouse grave fears of the consequences. Ihe an nouneement of two failures were the only actual disasters to develop and neither oI these was a surprise. Some of the oay liquidation was supposed to be of coiiat- eral on the loans of the failed firms al- though it was officially announced in one case that the creditors had decided to withhold the collateral from the market in it's present condition.
 It was evident that a very general clos ing out of collateral in loans was in pro gress and much of 1t was allowed to go for what it would bring. As the demand for stock is still exceedingly light the nat ural result was demoralization of the market and the pressure grew more acute by the reactionary effect of the selling in forcing shrinkage of the collateral in oth- CT loans. So far as the news of the day
 
 sis for the sacrifice of securities beyond the uneasy sense that collateral could not be readily realized on and the consequent desire to convert into ready money. Thls is the essence of demoralization An any market and it had it's natural result to- day Expectation was at the high pltch at the opening and demoraization was prevented only by the most vigorous and determined support on the part Of bank ing interests and market managers TUT various prominent stocks.
 The support was especially notable In the United States Steel stocks and succeeded in raising the price of the common point and the preferred 1ss over last nights lev el The support of these stocks was helped by the fact that some of the develop ments which were feared from yesterday meeting of directors did not occur As the weakness of these stocks was po- tent factor in the weakness of yester- days market, the strong support accord ed them this morning had soothing ef- feet on sentiment. The result was pret- ty general recovery from the opening de- clines Then came the announcement of the first failure, that of an important house with commitments in variety or stocks. From that time until the close the liquidation was intermittently pursued with occasional rallies on short covering. There was an eager rush to cover among the bears in the final dealings, but even then there was renewed breaks at other points and the closing was extremely ner- vous and excited with very irregular flue- tuations
 The United States Steel stocks suffered comparatively small losses but both the common and the preferred and the sinking fund five per cent bonds touched low rec ord prices during the day. Liquidation In Missouri Pacific was very violent and it suffered an extreme loss of 69s. Much Of the liquidation in this was attributed to the account of one of the suspended firms. It carried down Wabash preferred points with 1t. Erie was also very heavily sold as the day progressed. The Pacifics and grangers were under steady pressure dur ing the most of the day. The violent de- clines in the Coloraoo and Southern stocks the Southern railway stocks and Virginia Carolina Chemical were associated with the failures Some ef the high priced com paratively inactive stocks were severe suf- ferers, American snuff breaking l5 and New York airbrake, Pullman, Consoidat- ed Gas General Electric and Chicago and Eastern Illinois certificates from to 10 points,
 Call loans were slightly firnrer but there was nothing in the time money market to explain the pressure to retire loans further sharp break in sterling exchange caused an approach in the rate towards the gold import point. Profit taking in the grain markets was a satisfactory develop ment which was offset, however by the continued speculative manipulation in cotton A cut In price of steam coal by the Reading and lack of Rock Island strike, which was denied. were made something of by the bears Satisfactory reports of railroad earnings including i3 per cent increase in gross earnings for July over last year by the New York Gen. tral, were without any influence upon the sentiment.
 Bonds were weak in sympathy with stocks. Total sales, par value. $4.6i0,000
 United States bonds were all unchanged on the last call.