The Birmingham age-herald. [volume] (Birmingham, Ala.) 1902-1950, 1904-10-28
WAR SCARE CAUSES
GREAT VIOLENCE
Bump" Predicted by Hill is
Administered
MARKET WAS SUSCEPTIBLE
Jump In Foreign Exchange and Sharp
Advance In Wheat Were Suffi-
Gent Evidence of Danger
of a Crisis.
MARKET WAS SUSCEPTIBLE

New York, October 27.-The war scare
ragged with great violence In Wall street
for a time today and ravaged the specu+
lative price level to which the market
had been lifted, but before the close Of
the day quieter counsels prevailed, and
the question began to be asked whether
in the event of actual hostilities between
Russia and Great Britain, American in
vestment properties would be hurt in the
proportion indicated by the headlong
plunge of prices during the morning.
The action of the market In comparison
with that of other securities markets
looked as though the damage from the
threatened clash would converge on Amer
lean securities. The inference was plain
that a weak technical position made this
market acutely susceptible to sudden un-
favorable development. This condition OF
the market has been pretty plain to care
full observers for some time. The uneasi-
ness regarding the positions which have
grown up with the evidences of top
heaviness for the last few days was ag-
gravated by the warning offered by
President Hill of the Great Northern in
a quoted opinion on the course of spec
ulation that operators had better be
little cautious or they may get bumped"
The war scare administered the bump,
and it proved rather severe. decline
In few minutes of to 8 points run
ming generally through the active list,
was sufficient to throw out many specu-
lative holdings, and to necessitate great
agility on the part of holders of very
much larger amounts to prevent sacrifice,
and increase indefinitely the pressure on
the market. AS it was, the uncovering Of
stop-loss orders precipitated large spec
ulative holdings on the market, and broke
through all the artificial restraints sought
to be opposed to the fall.
The jump in foreign exchange, and the
sharp running up of wheat were sufficient
evidences of the reality of the danger Of
the crisis. But the exaggerated effect on
the stock market was a demonstration Of
the artificial conditions which had been
built up there. The same thing was ap-
parent in the heaviness of the declines in
stocks which have been most subjected
no the booming process, although the in
trinsic value of the properties thus repre-
scented would be no more impaired by an
Anglo-Russian war than would any
Others on the list of securities
The stability of bond prices was an adj
hltional illustration. the losses in that de-
partment being almost wholly confined to
convertible bonds or such as had moved
in sympathy with the undue advances in
their allied stocks. The most direct effect
of the foreign situation on our affairs was
in the additional engagements of gold for
export to Paris. The immediate crisis in
the international affairs cannot be held
responsible for this which is In prepara-
tion for further Russian loan in the
regular prosecution of the war with
Japan But the effect on the local money
situation is of immediate Importance, with
the interior demand still in force. The
threatened impairment of bank reserves