The Birmingham age-herald., 1912-10-20
GREAT INTERESTS
 SUPPORT MARKET Expected Boom Will Start From Present Level ALL STOCKS ARE UP Wilson's Election Is Regarded As Foregone Conclusion But Wall
 Street Is Paying Little At
 tention to Politics
By W. G. NICHOLAS

By W. G. NICHOLAS
 New York, October -(Special.)-lt : Is becoming apparent that the great in- l. terests of Wall street are lending their : support to the market. to the extent of preventing relapse of importance In prices. There is an equally plain 2 disposition on the part of the people of affairs. to check any tendency to put through speculative bull campaigns. although many pools and syndieates are impatient to break away and start the machinery. The money market B : not yet in shape for gigantic specu- lative boom in stocks such as traders would like to see, and for that reason . the banking interests which are really : carrying the load for the very wealthy syndicates and individual operators are diseouraging too much activity at the moment. At the same time there IS an equally earnest desire on the part of these very same interests to pre- vent important reactions. Every time : prices break or display a tendency that way broad support is given values and prices recover to the high levels that were established some weeks ago, or so nearly at that level that the margin of shrinlsage appears very small when measured by actual quotations
 Groups of wealthy men are back of ]. all of the big trust companies and banks and as their centralized invest ments are up collateral for enor- ! nous aggregate loans it is clearly to !. the interest of the financial institutions to maintain strong situation. 1t isl : patent that conditions are not just right for further large advances in the gen. : eral stock market but unless appear ances and signs are deceptive the : great bull movement will start from level around the current range. Those . who have been looking for a sensa- tional break, as a preliminary to the predicted stock market boom, began to feel that they are scheduled for a dis . appointment in that respect It is A fact hot generally appreciated that prices are very much higher than they were l. a year ago. The boom has been in z measure already discounted Com rared with the prices of year ago : Alma lgamated Copper is up 37 points Shelters 20 Northern Pacific 40 Read ing 35, United States Steel 16, Union Pacific 10, Baltimore and Ohio g, Ameri- can Can, common and preferred 35 and SS, respectively; and the general av- a tidSc iiSt lIOni D tD lO pOl4lS. The Te- action from the high levels reached about month ago is only to points Around these reacted levels prices are Icing held stubbornly.
 Speeulators have taken profits in large aesregate amount and there has been continuous and heavy short sell ing but8o on all the soft spots the stuff + taken in quantity. The outside pub lie Is not buying in a wholesale way ct the present writing but it is clearly Tot letting go securities taken on dur ing the previous advance The basic sentiment Is one of unmistakab1e and decided strength and nothing seems able to swerye 1t or to diminish the under lying confidence. That feeling is na- tional and underlies the entire business situation. of which the stock market is : only feature.
 Speculative activity centered more largely on the Steel stocks than most people realized. That was the first de- partment of industry to feel the turn for the better and insiders have made great killing by taking hold early There has been an advance since year ago in the price of half dozen of the principal steel companies aggregating at least $200,000.000. United States Steel leads off with gain of s90, 900, 900 and the half dozen. leading independents ! have gained fully as much more. This 2 list includes Bethlehem Steel, which Is up 23 points, Lackawanna 25 points, Republic common 20 points, Republic preferred 2S points, Colorado Fuel and Iron and Sloss- Sheffield 19 points each
 IL will be seen, therefore, that the / market has not been idle or slow to appreciate the significance of the busi- ness revival which began to make itself felt about six months ago. It does not follow, however, that prices will not go higher. The shrewdest specu- lators, investors and promoters believe that the upward swing Is not half way accomplished yet and that the gen eral advance will be at least doubled k<fore the top is reached By the mid cfe of winter the pressure of money for crop moving and incidental purposes will have greatly relaxed and capital which is now employed by hundreds of millions of dollars in that field will be largely available for Wall street uses The genuinely big people are not anxious to have the movement start in earnest until money conditions will
 justify faith in their ability to keep the machinery going. The one thing they appear anxious to avert Is any rious reaction from the current levels, as stated in the opening paragraph of this dispatch.
 The street is giving Mir. Prick credit ; for being q leading factor in the stock market. He is leading figure in Atch- lSo0, Steel, genuSslNdiiid anu lS bS interested also in the anthracite coal stocks, although in this class of securi- ties he has been to some extent super seded as a leader by Messrs. D. c. Reid, Judge William H. Moore and the power ful group of capitalists who are classi- fled as the First National bank crowd. There is literally no limit to the re- sources of this company of capitalists and for the most part they work in concert. although there are many in- diyidual interests in connection with the combination. The Copper stocks arc also hacked hv vast and we'll gem