Indiana daily times., 1922-02-03
SHORTAGE IN
OFFERINGS ON
STOCK MARKET
Buyers Find Shares None Too
Plentiful and Prices
Turn Upward.
COMMODITIES IN GAIN
Special to Indiana Daily Times
and Philadelphia Public ledger.
BY MONITOR.

fcult to explain the strength Of yester-
days market on any other than technical
grounds. News Of an important character
was lacking, and one might almost say
absent. Nevertheless, the market had
stiff undertone, and the volume of trans
actions showed a gain Of 40 to go per
cent over that of the last two or three
days At the same time the total was
only about three quarters of a million
shares. Buyers, however, found stocks in
none too plentiful supply. It made little
difference to what group or issue one
turned, the situation was in most re-
spects similar Steels, coppers, motors,
oils and specialties quickly made an up
ward response when buying made its
appearance Pools had some difficulty in
getting back stock recently sold for the
purpose of establishing buying power
when needed.
Commodities turned stronger Cotton
had an early break, but was firm at the
close at q recovery of 80 to 40 points from
the low level of the morning Wheat sold
higher than it has been in months, while
foreign exchanges were strong, with the
exception of italian lire which declined
on the new cabinet upset
Strength developed in the steels along
rather broad lines. Oils were higher, and
Cluett Peabody, Phillips-J ones, United
Fruit, Electric Storage Battery, Dawson
Chemical international Paper and Punta
Allegro Sugar. Third Avenue was the
strongest of the local fractions Ameri-
can Ice ran up to a new high level, bIt
q subsequent reaction left it unchanged.
Market movements have more to do
with making sentiment, than sentlmens
has to do with the making of markets
&c fo hot
timent throughout the Street once more
takes on an undertone of confidence. The
difficulties reported to be confronting the
soldiers bonus" bill have given ground
for encoura agement.-Copyright, 1922, by
Public Ledger Company.
BY Monitor. Wall Street Gossip.
With a paucity Of news which might
affect security prices, quotations for prac-
tlcally all classes of stocks advanced
vigorously through the days session
The technical position about which
much is written and little understood,
really was the dominant factor in the
activity.
Wednesday the situation in many
speculative favorites was such as to cause
genuine alarm among pool managers. In
at least four cases pool managers had
sold all Of their speculative holdings In
an attempt to keep quotations down. ne
short interest was of such magnitude
that these offerings not only were aD-
sorbed but new short interest was
created. The result yesterday was the
inability of many pools to furnish stocks
in response to the demand from both
the professional trading element ana
outsiders. There is no indication at the
moment that this situation will correct
itself for several days.
Among the spectacular movements of
ba dav ha advances Of more than Twelve
points in Phillips J ones and OF more
than seven points in Cluett PeaP9ay.
Ten days ago it was reported that Man,
haitian Shirt Company would De the LnLLu
member of q merger embracing the otneT
two Neither confirmation nor oehiai
was obtainable, nor has any oHlclats
statement been made, me me acsaeg eaes,ons
these stocks III recent market Sessions %
confirms the rUmor in the mlhus Vi 'he
since last summer when United Fruit
sold below par, professionals nave FPem Pom
time to time it was reported tnat tne @
company has sustained great losses On
it's sugar business. 1t develops now thal
the loss was less than one-slxth oL
cont ner mound. or approximately $ooU,.
non as compared with total earnings OF
nearly SIS, 100000. The shorts iounu III III
tle stock with which to cover their com
mitments in today's market
Anaconda as a result Of the proposal
TO exchange it's shares for those OF Amerl-
can Brass. The actual transfer OIL aHo-
conda certificates to American BRASS
shareholders will occur rep; a. -
understood Many of these holders are
not waiting until then to sell their STOCK,
but are letting it go now. Ihls creates
technical short interest, aand accounts
in part also for the relative heaVlness
of Anaconda.
Failing in their attempts to recover
stock sold to check the advance anu
hiring about a reaction in the MOTOR
shares interests which have been acIlVe
in the recent advance in these stocks
have turned again to the buy!hg sue
and are attempting to regain thelr specu
Iative holdings, according 10 rePoEtS "a
usually well-informed circles me 3n15, snUt.
interest in these stocks Is OF unWleidy
Droportions, and 1t is understood tnaC
when the Chicago motor show closes at
the end of this week some exceedingly
ontimistic news on the motor shares may
be forthcoming.
The steel stocks became aggressive IN
the last hour. United States steer crosseu
Sc on a large volume OF tradlng Just tbo Re
highest quotation. Republic and Lacka-
wana also were well bought. VI the
minor issues a speculative group operat-
ing in Vanadium brought about SUD
StaDt1al advance III lts pLASo' AO
hopeful tone of the weekly trade reviews
was responsible for considerable amount
of outside buying according to wire house
reports.
In presenting a report of operations for
December and for the year, the directors
Of the Southern Pacific Railroad issued
statement calling attention OF seeming
discrepancies in the figures. In accord
ance with the order Of the Interstate
Commerce, 1t is necessary, the officials
saw to include certain unaudited items OF
expense. Three inyOlvev largely estimates
Of claims and while appearing as obliga
tions really are items against the Gov
ernment during the period of Federal
guarantee For December operating reve-
nues show a decrease of S4783, ,175. Oper-
ating expense decreased $500 ,157. Net
operating revenues decreased 81 3S4, ,01S,
and the net deficit after rents, etc, in
creased 81 ,935S28. For twelve months
operating revenues decreased S12775, ,139.
and net operating income after rents etc,
increased $14 ,634 447. With these esti-
mated items eliminated, the report says
that the net operating income for the
month is 1851, 1872 and for the year $751;
S2S.06S which is about S4.O0O,0O0 more
than given in the statement under the 1.
c. c. orders.
The annual report of the North Amer
lean Company TO be issued in a few
days, will, it is understood show a bal
ance for the common stock more than
% per cent greater than in 1920 In that
year after allowing for the full years
dividend on the preferred now outstand-
ing, the balance was equal to about
SIS per share on the present outstand-
ing common.
Directors of the May Stores declared