The Bridgeport evening farmer., 1915-10-28

thousand slabs for the same period l last year. We have. gain of 15O thou sand slabs in receipts and an increase of 2S4 thousand slabs in shipments which indicates an improvement in
 zinc demand.
 Copper production continues to in crease and the price has made a ma terial recovery. since the decline of
 June and July. The visible supply of copper for the United States has re- gently shown slight increase while the worlds supply has decreased. The coke production at Councils vile for the last. week reported was AIS thousand tons or 11,32 cars com pared with 398 thousand tons or 10,- H674 cars for the week previous. Of the I39 thousand ovens in the district, {ap- proximately 30 thousand are burning the actual number of ovens out be- ing g 1908, Coke producers are ex- pect1ng stronger market and stfffer
 prices and nothing like present quota honSI will secure a ccntr3ct for 1916 coke. in any considerable quantity.
 The production of gold at the Rand mines during September was nearly TIT thousand fine ounces compared with TOP thousand fine ounces for the same month last year. The value of the September production was over sixteen million dollars com pared. with 1 a production valued at less than 5 million dollars in September 1914 While the average of comm odity prices is much higher than a month ago and greatly higher than a year ago. and while the present average quotation on all commodities com bined is higher than at any time since the Civil War, this figure taken as a whole is likely to be misleading. Dur ing the month Bradstreet reported an advance in price of 50 articles. a de- cline in 20, with SC remaining stat ionary. The whole group conpris- ing live stock and the whole group of metals during September. A com parison of price levels of the present livestock provisions and naval stores to be cheaper than year ago. Tn fact, living expenses arc less than they were a year ago and building mater ials only sIighly higher. Textiles are materially higher and metals have year. A still larger increase has been shown, of codrse,5 in chemical and drug lines.
 Reports from all the smaller cls- tom districts are not yet available 1 but the thirteen principal districts | handling go per cent of our Foreign i Trade show imports for the seven | weeks from August 30 to October 16 og 2I6 million dollars and exports I of 42S million dollars, leaving a netI favorable trade balance of PIP mill | lion dollars for that period
 Bank cIearings for September for the 16O principal cities were nearly 1 Is billion dollars Acompared with ten billion dollars a year fgo.t a gain of ST per cent. The eAin outside of l New York City taken alone cleared l 108 per cent. Out of 16O cities, 107 l showed gains for the month. the most important gains in the largest cities l being reported from Boston, Philadel- p1lia and Cleveland. Leaving New 1 York City out of consideration, and therefore taking no account of the unusual activity Of the stock market l and giving proper consideration to the Clearing method brought about | by the operation of the Federal Re- serve Banks. the gain in bank ex- E changes for the remainder of the Country indicates a clear gain of not l less than 25 per cent in commercial | transactions and real estate. This is stupendous gain and should satisfy | the most skeptical that business gen. erally is fairly on it's feet and that our l activities are not by a44y means con- | fined to export business. In fact our exports to neutral countries, we re- gret to say, have declined.
 On the first of October, the total money in circulation was 3.73O mil lion dollars compared with S.625 mil | lions month ago and S.695 millions a year ago. the circulation per capita | is $S6t88 cohnpared with S35.S9 a |
 
 The Federal Government reports the present population of the United | States at 1o1,151 thousand souls.
 Dividend disbursement for October | will reach g 5 million dollars and in- sterest payments will be s6 million doI- lars Total dividend and interest dis | bursem ments for October will be 181 |
 million dollars compared with 162 | million dollars asyear ago. This makes the October dividend and interest | showing the best since the war begun l as compared to the corresp onding month of previous years.
 November I1laturities will only a. mount to only 22 million dollars or Railroad maturities for the month | will be less than twelve million doI- lars and Industrfals slightly over 10 | million dollars During this year In- dustria1 rnaturities totaled 153 mill | lion dollars while for 1916 there are trial securities to mature. The largest single maturity among the Industrials | next year will be less than five million dollars, while tAis year we have sev- .eral iindividual naturities of larger amounts. The way is clear for new financing in 1916-
 transactions on the New York Stock Exchange during September numbered 1S,52s thousand shares compared with 2O,470 thousand shares compared with 20 thousand in shares in August. Bond sales were 82 million dollars compared with 73 million dollars in August. The Sep tember Bond sales were the largest for any month since January, 1914.
 The average price of 60 niscellan- eous selected stocks on the first of the month was 100. 83 compared with 9O54 two years ago. No comparison can be made with year ago because the Exchanges were closed The average price of a selected list of rail- road bonds on the first of the month was TITS compared with 76.80 a
 month previous and S5.S5 two years previous During the month 20 rail- road stocks increased in price from