The Abbeville press and banner. [volume] (Abbeville, S.C.) 1869-1924, 1915-07-28
ARE WE TO HAVE
A BUSINESS BOOM?

boom?" asks Theodore H. Price Of
New York, in the Worlds Work, anG
he cites numerous facts and instan'
ces to sustain the theory that this
country will experience an era of ad.
vancing prices such as is already ex.
istent in Europe, and he concludes
that "under such circumstances large
profits will accrue to the business
man who is content to become an op-
portunist while still preserving his
facility of mental detachment from
the mob when its frenzy is approach
ing the point of exhaustion" This
opinion rests upon the assumption
that there may be wild speculation,
for he remarks hat "the culture beds
of the collective human mind seem
just now peculiarly hospitable to the
germs of febrile inflammation"
To introduce his argument Mr..
Price alludes to a book written some
years ago by Edwin Lefevre and
called "The Golden Flood" It mar
rated an Illuminating piece of fiction
showing how seriously stocks and
bonds could be affected by q sudden
influx of gold in enormous volume.
The story pictured its hero as having
secured control of the gold war re-
serve Of Russia for the purpose of
making a loup in the market, al
though the bankers where he made
his deposits thought he had realized
that dream of alchemists-the trans
mutation of the baser metals into
gold-and they hastily began to ex-
change their money for interests in
productive properties Of various
kinds, while there ensued a panic,
with falling prices in bonds, and sim
%ultaneously a wild advance in stocks.
"The economic chaos brought about
by the European war;" remarks Mr..
Price, promises some effects that
are quite as fantastic as those pic
tured in the Golden Flood"
For the seven months ended June
30 he says that the value of exports
from the United States to all coun-
tries will probably exceed all imports
by more than $9,00,O00,O0 (the fl
cures are not yet compiled), while:
the exports to Europe alone during
the same period will exceed imports
from Europe by at least $1,000 00,-
900, and for the thirteen months
which will end December 81, 1915,
it seems probable that exports from
this country to Europe will exceed
imports from there by at least
$1,000, 600, The balance due
the United States, he observes, will
have to be paid in either American
securities held abroad, the available
supply of which he thinks nearly ex-
hausted in European securities or
promises to pay, which do not seem
to be acceptable here, or in gold.
Russian exchange is "a per cent. be-
low normal, German ID per cent,
Italian IL, French 4, and Eglish 1 II
per cent. below. Allowing for the
difficulties of transporting gold in
war times, he says it is plain that
the maintenance of specie payment
in Europe has been practically aban-
doned, and admission of the fact will
be duly made if the war continues.
This mea imitation; that business
in the warning countries will be con-
Quoted by means of a credit curren-
cy, as was the case in the United
States during the Civil War, when at
one time it required more than So
worth of greenbacks to purchase 81
in gold. But this country will re-
main in the position of being able to
demand gold in payment for what is
sold abroad, with the result that
gold will come here to pay
debts and more will also arrive for
safe keeping.
Then when gold reserves in Eu-
rope become as obsolete in theory as
they are in practice, the prices of
everything there as measured by the
paper money will | advance to per-
haps twice the prices now expressed