The Washington herald., 1921-05-15

NEW YORK, May 14.-Accordins
to interests that were active IN
many of the important movements
during the past week the specuia-
tive situation has again changed 10
an essential degree. 1t was cur,
rent gossip that a pool which hao
been at work for some time past
in one of the tobacco industriais
had retired from the field as a
buyer and had left the stock In
which IL had been active to take
care Of itself Early in the week
firm sold 5000 shares OF this
stock. starting it on its downward
movement, but the stock was bor-
rowed for delivery by an entirely
dIrrerent house and later selling or
ders of considerable Importance
came into the market indicating
that the pool had liquidated most
Of ITS holdings. The decline In the
stock was attributed to reports OF
crop damage which met only with
martial denial to interests con-
cerned in the property, but it was
generally assumed that the down
ward movement was due more to
dissolution of a pool than to the
reports of insect blight
This. however. was only one in
stance Of the abandonment OF mar
ket operations by recently formeo
pools. There were indications OF
liquidation early in the week In a
number of stocks that had peen
| moved up on what were regarded
! as pool orders. but the leading IN
terests in these market comolna-
tions insisted that the liquidation
was simply due to the fact Una.
the stocks accumulated could not
be sold at a substantial proht ana
! as that was the purpose OF their
purchase in the first instance rear
izing of profts must be regarded
as a natural sequence OF the move
iment. Several of these pools were
/ active in the low priced oil stocks
and in some OF the low priced In
dustrials and there were instances
where railroad stocks had been
moved up by pool operations with
the stocks sold as higher prices
were established. In the past Few
days absence of pool interest in the
market was more pronounced tnan
it had been at any time for over
month.
| Yesterdays late selling came as
a surprise to many of the specu-
'lative element on the floor Of the
exchange as they had been led to
believe that Improvement was pend
ing as the result Of the strong
showing made in the Federal Re
serve Bank statements on Thurs
day Some of those who attach
most Importance to the money out
look, thought that the extension
of III, period Of bank acceptances
and the arrangements for six
months loans on foreign transac
ons would have an important in
fuence on the speculative situation,
and these opinions were incentives
for some speculative accumulation
Of the usually active issues. Just
when the market showed the in
fiuence Of this buying 1t was sud
. denly unsettled by a series OF SELL
ing movements. about a half
dozen houses often acting for an
operator frequently described as
bear plungers selling many thou
sands of different issues within q
short period, and caused a general
unsettlement of the speculative SIT
uation. That a large part of the
selling for the past few days was
for short account was indicated also
by the recent developments in the
stock loan market where a grow
ing borrowing demand has been ir
evidence since Tuesday.
Payments on allotments of Bur
lington 6h per cent bonds are due
on Monday. The entire issue wa:
s23O,00O.000, but the belief pre-
vailed that exchanges of Burling
ton As, which were provided for II
the subscription offer. will reduce
the, amount to be paid for by fully
one-half. At the subscription pric'
of 96h this would mean about Slo1,'
00e. 900 required in making full pay