New-York tribune., 1918-07-07
Wall Street Watches for Victory Stock Market
Movement to Discount Cermanys Complete Defeat
~ OF ECONOMICS f lowing Security Prices and Volume
indicative OF Peace-Vau Have Reflected
feas-Nat Averages Show How Transactions Events
N Wall Street Of late there has been

Wall Street Of late there has been
much talk Of a victory market"
The financial community has been
discussing possibilities and probabili-
ties, and the opinion has been expressed
that sooner or later the stock and bond
markets, In their prophetic capacity of
discounting events long before they
happen, should begin to anticipate the
complete defeat Of Germany and the
final overthrow Of autocracy.
When such movement Is to start of
course, cannot be predicted with anv
degree of certainty any moro than It
can be said when the war Is to end
Nevertheless, on ali sides the action Of
the general security markets Is being
carefully watched by many students of
economics and finance who believe that
here will be reflected the first signs OF
peace by a general rise in market
values.
The fact that the trend of stock and
bond prices is SO intimately bound up
with the march of war events makes
the record Of particular interest at this
time. OF late the stock market has
been in quiet mood pending develop
ments both abroad and at home. But
the tone has been confident and the
tendency of prices to creep forward has
been looked upon as significant by
those who follow tho day to dav market
movements.
Since tho first Of Che year &here has
been not little Improvement in
security prices in general. In the face
OF the greatest German attacks since
the beginning Of the war, with initial
successes in the way Of large territorial
gains along the West front in France,
the stock market has made substantial
recovery from the low level of prices
established during the closing months of
1917. There has been nothing sensa-
tional about the recovering movement,
1t has been gradual, but mono the less
convincing. The Tribune's table of
averages shows plainly what has hap
pened. The figures indicate that stock
prices are entering the second half Of
the year with the trend still upward
How much further the recovery will
carry is question which, of course, no
one has the prescience to answer.
Banking opinion, always conservative
is unusually so now. Various views are
held by financial men of prominence as
to the future course of security prices.
The majority, probably, are convinced
that there cannot be a return of the
great speculative markets of 1915 and
1915 owing to developments that have
occurred since the United States en-
tered the war. Some hold to the opin-
ion that imitation is bound to bring
higher security prices just as it has
brought higher commodity prices and
higher wages for labor.
Wall Street Expects
A Long Struggle
There is one point on which they are
all agreed, however, and that Is that
the coming Of peace should be the most
constructive development in its effect
on security market prices that could
possibly occur. But leaving aside the
question of whether peace is near or
whether the war will be prolonged in
definitely, to be finished only when the
Germans are thoroughly beaten, there
IS no doubt that American holders Of