The Birmingham age-herald., 1905-03-02
INDUSTRIAL NEWS

The New York Commercial says:
 Col. T. G. Bush, president of the Ala bama Consolidated Coal & Iron company, and of the Shelby Iron company. yester- day issued a statement, In the course of which he discussed the proposed capi- talization of the new merger in highly optimistic vein He said in part:
 "rhe leading companies of Alabama own over 9O0OOO,0O0 tons of ore and over 2'5OO0OO,o0O tons of coal, most of 1t prac- tically within sight of the furnaces while the United States Steel corporation claims to own only 700, ,O0O0O0 tons of ore and only about TOGO or s0,0OO acres of coal land. In other words the Alabama companies own 2000O0,O0O tons of ore more than the steel corporation, and four or five times as much coal, as they have about 100000 acres of proved coal land The steel corporation puts a value of s1 a ton on It's ore in the ground and has to haul this ore about 1000 rnnes to it's furnaces, and on its coal lands 1t puts value of over $l000 an acre and it's capi- talization Is based on these valuations
 Now if the Alabama companies cap- ftalized their ores at the absuruly low price of 10 cents a ton and their coal at
  these raw materials alone are worth over S2l5, OOO0O0, and yet the steel corporation with less ore and not one-thrd as much coal, capttalzes it's ore and coal at. $S00,- 0O0 out of its total of over S1 300 O0O OO0 Then the plants, furnaces, steel works, coke ovens mines, etc., are worth over $50 O0O.00O and here Is total of $265 900, ,OO0 without counting the value of the vast economies which can be brought about by consolidation and the doubling within five years of the total output by the expenditure of S25, 900 900 or more in build ing new furnaces and steel works
 ''rhe consolidation of the Alabama iron and coal interests is the most natural consolidation which has been brought be- fore the country, and everybody has for some years seen that it Is of such eco- homie importance as to be inevitable For years the iron companies have been put ting back into Improvements all of their earnings, but by bringing them into one great organization ample capital can be secured for doubling the entire producing capacity of the district and In doing this quadruple the net earnings. Moreover, instead of selling our pig Iron at an aver age profit of s or "A ton, we can by building steel mills pipe works, etc, sell the finished product at more man twice as much profit.
 "These statements are not theories, but are based on actual facts easily sus- ceptible of demonstration Instead of s2OO,Oo0,000 to include S25000,000 or t50 100000 new capital for new works. being an over-valuation of Alabama iron and coal interests, I do not hesitate to say that with this new capital provided to | build steel works and other industries, this is much below the real and intrinsic value of these properties and that such a condition as exists in Alabama, with | such vast stores of ore and coal, would not be secured anywhere else in the world, and that with the proposed new capital invested for development work, | the real value of the Alabama situa- | ton will within five years be nearly worth $500, 900 than s2OO.OoO, 0oo."