New-York tribune. [volume] (New York [N.Y.]) 1866-1924, 1917-01-15
Monday, January Is, 1917
WALL STREET OFFICE:
Mills Building. l. Broad 81.

ventured a forecast of after-war
prospects. At first they were most
ly highly optimistic, but of late a
note of decided uncertainty has APP
pearcd. Indeed. warning business
against more or less vague dangers
which lie just beyond the horizon
OF war has become almost a fad.
In so far as such warnings serve
70 curb undue optimism, and thus
perhaps to check the tendency
toward over-extension, they perform
a useful function, but it is not i'm
possible that the thing can be over
done.
1t is hard to discover a solid
foundation for the wave Of pes
simism about the future which has
doomed up suddenly from nowhere.
Perhaps the explanation is that no
one really has sufficient economic
vision to cast the horoscope of Amer
lean business. What the ending of
the great war will bring is beyond
the understanding and from the be-
ginning man has feared that which
he could not understand. But there
is at least as much reason for be-
lieving that we shall continue to
forge ahead-that our prosperity
will outlast the war-as there is
for believing that an abrupt halt
will come with the cessation Of hos
tilities.
It is trite to say that the new
era has brought problems as big as,
and perhaps bigger than, any with
which we were ever confronted in
the past, but too much emphasis is
being laid on that point and too little
on the equally important fact that
our ability to cope with these prob
lens is also of greater dimensions.
1t has been said that we have crowd
ed into the last two years the prog
ress of a decade, and that is prob
ably an under. rather than an over,
statement. And despite the fact that
there is some initiation, business is
fundamentally in much sounder con-
dition than il has been for many
years, and we are surely in a better
position to meet whatever may come
than we ever were before. Europe's
misfortune has forced upon us great
er wealth, greater economic indie
pendence. even greater capacity for
thought in terms Of commerce and
finance. We have banking system
incomparably stronger and more
elastic than the one which it dis
placed. Also, we have had school
ing in the basic principles OF for
eign trade, as we'll as the means, to
greater extent than any other of the
trading nations, Of financing any
trade conquests that may be under
taken. Too, if the Webb bill passes
the Senate, as it should, our manu-
facturers will acquire unity Of power
in export trade which will place
them, in that respect, on an equal
/ footing with the German cartels and
/ the great trade combinations Of
other countries.
These, however, are but stray
items on the favorable side of the
country's balance sheet. Among 9th
ers is the fact that the guiding
powers of our great corporations
and the lesser ones, too, for that
matter-have in few instances been
carried away by the ecstasy Of fan
tastic profits. Instead Of distribut-
ing earnings as fast as they were
made. in general very conserva-
tive dividend policy has been pur-
sued, and profits have been used for
betterment, for equipment with the
latest high speed attachments, and
the like, in addition TO which enor-
nous cash balances have been built
up as insurance against anything
which the future may hold in store,
Also, it is to be noted that there
has been An Unprecedented amount
of forward buying. A recent tabu
lation Of returns from fifteen manu-
featuring corporations showed that
orders on hand at the close Of 1915
we're more than 200 per cent larger
than a year before, and $40 per cent
larger than at the end Of 1914, and
in most cases these orders were firm
Take the steel trade, for example
Not only have enormous profits beer
realized in the basic industry, but
enormous profits seem more thar
reasonably certain for a long time
to come. The necessities Of the bel
ligerent nations have been so press
ing that the steel trade has not only
been able to exact almost any price
which it cared to name, but TO die
tate other terms as well. One OF
those terms has been that orders
should not be subject to cancella'