The Birmingham age-herald., 1909-12-12
ANOTHER BOOM IS EXPECTED ID COME Signs In Wall Street All Point
 That Way LABOR TROUBLE UNLIKELY Passing of Gould Family From Active Management of Many Properties Is Interestino DeveIopment
 of the Times.
By w. G. NICHOLAS.

Every indication points to a resumption of speculative activity. Signs multiply that another boom in the stock mar ket is imminent. The question Is as to the date of beginning Nine out of ten people met in the Wall street district will tell you they look for a boom in stocks after the hol lays. Where every body fixes a. date that way the chances are that the market will not wait that long, but will start in ahead of time. Something of that sort is among the strong possibilities of the near future It is very certain that a quiet absorp- ton of stocks Is going on, both for in vestment and speculative account The buying is very clearly not for the pur- pose of attracting attention. It seems to be by people who are chiefly desrous of getting their lines cheap in order to have full advantage of whatever ad- which they believe very sure to occur It is manifestly the province of specu- lation to discount the future and as the future seems to give promise of big things for courageous buyers we are quite likely to very soon get into dis- counting business on a scale sufficient to start strong bull movement ahead of the scheduled date
 Liquidation of stocks stopped two or three weeks ago. There has been al- most no selling out of long stocks since. The market is fairly full of profess siona1 traders of bearisn instincts bent on getting the last fraction of the re- action, which set in a couple of months ago. These people always get nipped and some of the stubborn ones lose good deal of money before acknowledg- ing themselves beaten. There Is also going on at this season of every year a squaring up of accounts and & book keeping evening up which calls for the buying and selling of stocks to a con- siderable aggregate amount. That has helped to keep commission houses and brokers busy or at least saved them from stagnation during the dull period.
 A fly in the ointment has been the threat of labor disturbance. There is felt to be small chance of real trouble on that score. The noise which is heard on that subject comes largely from the labor agitators who are desirous of im- pressing people with their importance. As . matter of fact everybody, employ CTS and employees alike. have known for a good while that an advance in wages would take place somewhere around tho beginning of tho new year and they have been preparing for 1t. The advance will be matter of peaceful negotia- ton between the representatives of the two interests. T;ie earnings of the rail roads warrant the advance and the men feel they have a right to expect 1t. They submitted to wage reduction during haN times and suffered quite as seriously as the railroads. Now that earnings are back again to the high standards 1t is felt to be only right and proper that the loyal employees should share the return of prosperity enjoyed by the transportation companies. The reports of great earnings which nave been hand- ed out to Wall street for the last six months have also been read by the hired hands and carefully digested by them with bearing on wage increases. Another thing which has been just little disquieting was the uncertainty att taching to the phrase and spirit of the. Presidents first anaual message to Ion- gress. The question at point has been just how far MT. Taft would pursue the Roosevelt policies of aggressive regula- ton and control of corporations. The general verdict seems to be that the business interests have little to fear from the present administration and that although no backward steps will be taken nothing will be done at Wash ington to threaten business or to alarm investment or cheek enterprise. At first the opinion was freely expressed that the message was weak and flacid. Closer study of the document is changing that view somewhat and it is now felt that what was at first thought to be weak ness might after all be only q return to the normal Wall street and the coun- try at large has been so accustomed to highly seasoned White House food that 1t ia not an easy matter to reaccustom the appetite to a change from tobasco sauce to plain salt and pepper. On re- flection the shift seems to be liked now that its true meaning is understood
 
 The halt in the upward high pressure movement in the iron trade, which was detected by the experts three or four weeks ago, has now become recognized by the public. It is not that there Is any, thing like 8 reaction. for that is not the case. It is merely letting off of steam and subsistence of excitement. South ern pig iron has eased off somewhat but the decline represents really nothing moro than a letup in speculative headway. Production Is going along in an entirely satisfactory way at a rate of about D. 500,00O tons better than the record fig- ures of 1907, and that must be considered about all that could be reasonably looked for. The output is proceeding at the rate of more than H.000,000 tons a year. Lake navigation has closed with a record of about 100000 tons of ore brought from the mines, a record-breaker. The expectation for next year is around 5O.- O00.00O tons. An interesting feature of the iron trade is found in the very large increase in the manufacture of bar iron, due to the enormous enlargement of the manufacture of agricultural implements and to the very large increase in the use of twisted iron in the reinforcement of cement construction.
 The passing of the Gould family from the active management of many of the properties with which the Gould name has been identified for three decades is a very interesting development of the times. II. 1<-l