Bisbee daily review., 1904-06-01
Wall Street
 Pruning Down
25oo CLERKS HAVE BEEN DIS MISSED FoR LACK OF
 BUSINESS.
Public Has Been Made Wary By Loss of Millions in IndustriaIsLAII the Brokerage Houses are Compelled to Make General Entertainments.


 New York, Tuesday Wall street is having such a period of business de- pression as it has not experienced in several years and one result of it is that hundreds of clerks have beel dismissed in the last ten days or two weeks. Men who have not known day of likeness in a score of years now finG themselves without employ. ment and with no prospect of any. thing to do until the dawn of another day cf prosperity in the street.
 Retrenchments have been made throughout the Wall street distric; Among the big brokerage concerns and banking houses the depression has been so pronounced that nearly all of them have found it necessary to reduce the working force. One of the largest operators On the Stock Exchange said yesterday that on .. conservative estimate he believed that nc less than 2500 clerks and otn ar employees had been dismissed oy the brokerage and banking houses in the last two weeks
 This operator called attention ;u the fact that only about a hundred thousand shares were traded in yes. terday and said that there was ID prospect of any improvement in busi ness at the present time.
 There are more than twelve hun dred banking and brokerage honsss in Wall street. said the operator When you divide the business of yes terday among all this multitude of in terests it must be patent at a glance that every day means an enormous loss to the operators. Every houss has found it absolutely necessary 70 make retrenchments in one way or another In most cases this has bean accomplished by the discharge of as many clerks as could be spared, and at present that means practically tn. whole force in all but the largest brokerage houses.
 Business is at the very least 50 per cent below where it was last year at this time. and to my mind it S,il reach a much lower ebb before thera is any evidence of improvement in ;he conl.tions. There are ample reasons for this enormous falling off in the Wall street trade. and nearly every firm iD the street has had ln, oresight to discount the inevitable The brokerage and banking houses have been anticipating this depres- sion and have been preparing for it for months. They have been steadily selling their holdings in stocks and bonds and the result is that today there is less floating stock in the street than there has been in many years.
 Among the reasons for the gener- al depression in Wall street trading perhaps the most potent grew out of the enormous losses sustained by the public in the industrial group. The blow that was given to investors in steel alone was sufficient to turn the public away from Wall street for a considerable period. The public lost millions in Steel common alone. and that has made the people wary of all classes of stock"
 The firm of J. P. Morgan & Co. was among the first to reduce it's working force when the hard times" nit the street. Others followed suit in rapid succession. The firm of W. B. Franklin & Go. sent notices yes terday to all of their force of clerks and stenographers that they must either accept 20 per cent cut in salaries or take vacations without any.