The Cairo bulletin., 1904-12-13
Wall Street

The following interesting resume
OF tie 'lrcnzicd" declines in stocks
in New IerS tac past tsso or thrse
weoks and particularly llla pass
week ! from the New Yor! 1imes
of sunday
I Whonayer Wall street Is confront
cd with sudden rise or a sudden
drop in the price OF the securities n
which il is interested it makes an
attempt 10 explain the situation, and
in doing his il passes over the tech-
nical conditions oi the market which
made the movement in either dircc-
tiou possible This disregard of tech
nical conditions in attempting to ar.
rive at plausible explanation is not
50 much due 10 wilfulness as 10 the
fact thar the technical conditions are
selfeyideni The Wall street com
munity knows perfectly wcll Chat
when the stock market has been
over-boughl. that Is when q spccu a.
tive structure has been reared on
advancing prices. the structure gets
weaker as ii nears the top, because
it becomes honeycombed with weak
ly margined accounts. accounts built
up on unsecured profits, and stop loss
counts. But II also knows tina; this
structure can 90 on. If nor indefinite
ly at least for months, reaching high.
er and higher unless some outside
event some financial windstorm,
should come along and upset the bal
ance of the swayng structure The
cause, therefore, which Wall street
looks for is that which may be an ac-
cident, court decision upsetting
confidence, a presidents message, OF
q hundred other things. Il may be
deliberate blow aimed by someone
more ready more quick of sight in
detecting the psychological" mo
ment when the market was ready 10
yield.
In the break last week this out
side factor was Thomas W. Lawson
Of Boston While the excitement of
and Thursday was al its
height. every small Spectator whose
profits and principal had been wiped
put blamed the Boston man for what
he considered a nefarious attack on
values. But whsn order was once |
more restored, when after the storm |
< was found That stock market val, |
les were about where they had been
q little over week ago, the sold-out |
SPECTATOR and the street in general |
stopped 10 consider if il was Lawson
and only Lawson who had done this
hing The street began to work it's
memory. and this Is what it remem.
Jered
IL was the day before Thanksgiv |
ng when Lawson made public his |
Thanksgiving Prayer" In that |
and remarkable docu
nent he declared that Wall stree
rad rumored that he was loaded up
with 100000 shares of AmaIgamated |
loo, 900 shares of sugar. and 10000 |
shares of Pacific Mail, and that he |
would be forced to liquidate. II. this
4 spelled with capitals, he should |
ind that this report was true, Their
le would on Friday after Thankseiv
ng throw over these holdings at ex |
lctly IL o'clock, and would Wall |
street please help him to get as good |
prices as possible? Wall street read |
his advertisement with astonish |
nent. It had heard nothing of such |
4 report-in fact. il said boldly that |
such a report never was circulated |
md must therefore have been invent |
I'd purposely for the use in the ad |
iertisement
But there were. many spectators !
md even brokers. not ordinarily easy |
10 deceive. who watched the hour o. |
u approach with some apprehen |
sion. There was considerable selling |
IF the stocks mentioned. aud they
showed the effect of the selling by |
,-point declines. but the hour pass
I'd. and, although up to the very last
minute before the clock struck Law |
son had kent the nerves of the ner
fous on the jump by startling tele
grams and flashes of warning. and Of |