Evening star., 1905-07-30
THE INSIDE OF
WALL STREET
BY EDWIN LEFEvRE.

If there Is one lesson more than another
which the stock market should have taught
the speculative community lately, it is the
value of patience; not the philosophical
value of it, but its value In cold cash. The
market has been SO dull SO deficient in
what the street calls definite trend" that
the fluctuations of prices have been unim-
portant. That is the limit In the eyes of
Spectators. If the game is not even worth
while guessing, what is the use of Wall
street? The use of Wall street Is that in
teiligent people with some money and much
patience may increase their fortunes at the
expense of other people with less money
and very much less patience. 1t is very
uninteligent thing. impatience. 1t is also
very decidedly national trait of ours.
The world over people wish to get rich and
to get rich quickly. But in other countries
people do not mana ge to get rich so quick
ly as they do in the United States, nor do
so many of them get rich at all. Apart
from the men who are successful in stock
gambling or in lucky mining strikes or at
the race tracks. We find manufacturers and
merchants becoming extremely rich in just
a few years of good times It may be
the protective tariff it may be the ma
tiorfal extravaganza and wastefulness of
consumers, or any reason you please DO
iitical. philosophical or industrial. but the
idCl lNdt mUltltuQluOuS EXAMPLES
JUSTLY the visions of quick wealth among
US to a greater degree than elsewhere
Americans may not be smitten with greed
more than other nations, but when they
are not making money they are more i'm
patient than the rest which is natural
enough. In Wall street this trait is par
ticulariy pronounced In periods of duIlness
such as the present. doubtless because the
greater part of the spectators consists
of professionals and semi-professionals and
to them the dullness means the nearest ap-
proach to starvation that can come to such
people. Moreover. there is the evaporation
of not knowing which side to take. because
neither seems especially promising
TIL big mem have patience They have
TO have it; if they didn't they would not be
what they 1t is. OF course immeasur-
ably easier for Mr.. Morgan to wait than
it is for a l.oGo-share gambler to be calm
When financler of the first class conducts
a big deal the very magnitude Of his oper-
ations compels him to go slowly. Their
operations are more than stock market
campaigns oftener than not. But even In
their stock gambling they must be patient.
Mr.. Harrimans famous Equitable loan
shows that ne must necessarily be more
ieisurely in his movements and more phio-
sophicdl in his wishes than a pker. He
borrowed s2.100.oG0, his collateral being
$4,000 shares Of Union Pacific stock. The
fore, was f6iSU10. The stock would have
to go to 1i0 before he could double his
money on paper. But unless the market
broadened and became active he could not
market even his $4,000 shares at one price
and he probably carrying other
stocks elsewhere. SO he waited. He could
afford to. 1t was not that the Equitable
was a complaisant and generous lender but
that he had more than ample margin. and
he knew what the value of the stock was
In the meantime he would not starye He
therefore was patient 1t would not be
surprising If he cleared cool million on
that little block of patiently held stock 1t
is not likely, but in point of fact he could
have made more. Even if he made but a
quarter of a million, it was a profitable
philosophy that compelled him to be pa
tient.
There is scarcely stock dealt in on the
New York Stock Exchange that has not it's
record as moneymaker for the patient.
You may call it farsightedness or good
judgment. or pluck. or even patriotism but
1t was patience that did the trick. The great
est fortunes have been made by people who
held securities when they were low priced
and kept holding them until they became
valuable and high priced. The country has
always grown up to the water in the CAPT
talization of its corporations. and the origi-
nal ground-fioor buyers who stuck by the
original stock have Jared we'll. In point
OF TACT. SO many Of these stocks were in
the nature of bonuses that they cost moth
ing and had voting power. whence the pa
tience and profit. One Of the Philadelphia
street railway magnates in speaking of the
Standard OH told me once that he had 8 600
shares of 1t which he figured cost him I50
per cent less than nothing. He had bought
the stock when 1t was selling around par
or say about sooo.o0o. He had received
.<ap1 Cd Anr \