The sun., 1919-06-07
FINANCIAL NEWS
AND COMMENT
General List Closes Higher in
Spite Of Considerable
Profit Taking.
STEELS AND RAILS ACTIVE
Interest Shifts to Specialties
and feathers and Coppers
Get Extra Attention.
STEELS AND RAILS ACTIVE

Trading in yesterdays stock market
proceeded along the same lines as on
Thursday. with caution still being exer--
cised in some quarters In the matter Of
placing new commitments and with Wall
Street in general, however, seemingly as
confident as ever not only In the ability
OF the market TO maintain Its advance.
but to continue II. Trading was much
less exciting than in Immediately pre-
ced'ng sessions for the reason that the
wide swings to which Wall Street has
become accustomed to OF late we're con-
spicuous for their absence and for the
additional reason that the trading was
more orderly from start to finish. But
there was no question at any time about
the confidence In back OF the buyins,
which went on again from the outset In
spite of the open bearishness OF some OF
the large commission houses. As on the
preceding day, the market was called
upon to face a considerable amount
of profit taking in the afternoon, but all
OF this was easily absorbed, and gem
orally speaking the list as a whole closed
the day substantially nlsner.
The principal reason why yesterdays
movement made a Detpr impression
upon the speculative fraternity was that
II occurred in spite of the fact that Wall
Street had been looking for a reaction.
the financial community all prepared to
see substantial setback in prices on top
of the two days advances. but as 1t
turned out the market was strong again
from the outset, and what made an even
better impression was that the principal
part OF the dealings in the first three
hours of the session converged again on
the steels and railroad shares This
naturally carried the impression, whether
-
was of more substantial sort than that
OF the first part of the week, when inter-
est in securities centred largely on the
motor shares and specialties. The
strength of the rails and the steels was
not maintained throughout the day,
there being some shifting OF attention
lack again into the specialties in the
last hour, while the market in the stand
ard issues was being readjusted, but
whatever unsettlement this may have
created was more than made up by the
advance which occurred in the special
ties and by the fact that the whole mar
ket turned strong again in the last few
minutes with closing prices at or near
the high of the day.
The best feature OF the days trading
undoubtedly was that the market was
more orderly than II has been in the
immediate past. Trading went on again
II
kept well in hand and at no time was
there such excitement as occurred in
the sessions OF the first three days of
the week. The advance was quite gen.
eral in the early part of the day with
the leadership being vested in such
stocks as Steel common, Reading. Atch-
ison and others, but this did not last
long. for the advance In these issues had
been continuous for the last two days
without any signs OF profit taking. In
the afternoon. however, stock came out
on the market and the speculative inter-
est shifted to the epecialties again. Gen.
eral Motors made another sharp ad-
vance. Worthington Pump was an out
standing feature and more than the
usual amount OF attention was mani
tested in such issues as the feathers.
American Linseed and the coppers. The
advance in these shares was important,
however. in that II indicated that the
money situation had cleared sufficiently
to allow the pools and cliques to resume
operations again.
There was no change in the money
situation. Call money loaned on the
Stock Exchange all day again at the e-6 y
per cent. level. Bankers were still uncer-
tain about the outlook in that the tax
payments fall due on June Is and in that
there will be an enormous strain on
the banks involved in the July divi-
dend payments. but they were of tn !.
! opinion that. so far as the present is
| concerned. there is no reason why money
| should go above the 6-6ia per cent
level. Nevertheless it was apparent that
the stock market was paying close atten-
ton to the money market and that the
/ large interests were watching for more
| important indica tions of an improvement
| in this direction before attempting to
enter the market again in a large way.
With the public, however, it was an
entirely different story. The foreign
| exchange market was firmer. Sterling
underwent some improvement and there
was a sharp advance In both lire and
francs, otherwise foreign exchange rates
were about unchanged from the preced-
! ing days closing.