Evening star., 1920-02-27
RAILS FEATURE
STOCK MARKET
By SIT ARR r. WEST.
Special CerrcspOndrnt of The star.

ruary .1-Announccmcnt that the At
torney General after examination OF
the railroad hill. nd seen no consti-
tutional objections in it was taken to
mean the removal OF whatever re-
naming doubt there had been about
the President giving it his sigma
ture.
ACCORDINGLY. it encouraged a fresh
wave of buying in the low priced
railway shares this morning. IN the
course of which most OF them equaied
their prevuus high points ana some
Of them went higher still.
The most vigorous advance. as mas
been the case all along. occurred in
Rock Island. st. Louis and San Fran
cisco and New Haven, all OF Which
figure out among the chief bensf1ci-
aries of the new legislation. ihe
standard rails were drawn along, out
only to a slight degree.
Fair Response TO Rails.
For a while the industrial list made
"A fair response to the strength in the
low priced rails. The short interest,"
still overcrowded in the high-priced
specialties was frightened into doing
some further covering.
stocks like General Motors, Bald
win Locomotive. Crucible Steel. Nexi-
cun Petroleum and Pan-American
were DlQ up with Some NiotehSe. hut
as these covering purchases ceased
and as the edge was taken off Of the
forward movement in the rails the
professional element began to pay at
tentien again to the short side of the
industrial list.
Steel common selling eX. the quar-
terly dividend was offered down in
large blocks While Lacl1awanna
Steel held up better than many had
expected after the extremely poor
showing in the annual report, these
earnings figures had their depressing
effect. Republic steel after brief
rally. proved sensitive and so did
American Wool and the motors. e+
Retail stocks.
4 very interesting revelation has
come about in connection with the six
months operations of the Retail stores
Company. No official statement has
yet been given out. but it Is under
stood that the dividend. at the rate Of
s per cent, for that period was cover
ed more than twice over. This divi-
dend money was secured from the
dividends on the United Cigar stores
stock in the Retail Stores treasury.
The remarka BILE thing is that outside
Of these dividends. which are from the
revenue derived from operations un-
connected entirely with the cigar
stores business, the retail stores con
amount was covered into the treasury
as cash. with the result that assets
on the 18th of January included a sum
of nearly s5,0o0,0S0. which was wholly
in the shape either of cash or demand
loans.
This put the retail stores. Of course.
in an exceptionally strong position,
for outside of the capital stock the
company had no liabilities whatever
except a few thousand in accounts and
interest payable.
Remington Typewriter.
The Remington Typewriter net earn
ings for 1919 are estimated at close to
$al share on.the common stock. The
earnings in the year previous were
equal to Sl2.74 share on the common
stock. The earnings are figured at APP
proximateiy $3.lT0,000. and the figures
arrived at on the common are after de-
lueticns of dividends on the first and
second preferred. Under the reorgani-
"a ion plan which was put into effect
$l.6J0, ,0h0 during the year.
This. taken in conjunction with the
rapid and sustained increase in the
Company's net earnings. is said to
bring the question Of dividends on
Remington common very close. The
slump in exports is said not to have
affected Remington in the least and
it's foreign business is still as large
as 1t ever was. and this has always
been big item.
Fisk Rubber.
The run up in Fisk Rubber shares
this morning was due to the report
that the stock will be placed on a
dividend basis within the next few
days. 1t is said by those in a position
to know that the earnings of the com
pany will be better than at any pre-
vious time and these earnings and the
fact that the outlook is bright have
caused the directors to decide on the
declaration of dividend. 1t is the
belief that the dividend will be at
least 10 per cent.
Motor shorts Punished.
The punishment Of the shorts in the
motors stocks continued today. Bears
who have been attacking General Mo-
tors learned yesterday that it was
very hard to borrow the stock for de-
livery and il was reported in certain
quarters that one of the insiders had
ordered that no more stock he loaned.
These insiders are said to be more
hullish on their industry than when
the stocks were selling much higher
last year.