Evening star., 1923-08-03
BY IL. X. TREVOR.

BY IL. X. TREVOR.
| Copyright. 1923, by New York Commercially
| In the various periods when the
difficult, many stock statesmen natu-
rally look around for something else
1 to sell. At such times the high-class
stock salesman will often turn to
bonds, which may be at a low price
| and attractive to investors because
| Of their large income yield.
The salesman who has specialized,
however, in the selling of bogus Sc
curities feels no inducement to sell
bonds at the commission onered on
such sales, as compared with what ne
has been making by selling bunk.
| In the stock market depression
which followed the excesses OF the
war shares boom Of 1915-l9lo' the
swindling stock salesman for some
time found himself out of JOB.
| At about that time. however, a new
/ form of swindle, ready made to order
| by an international banking group
llay right before the stock statesmen
swindlers and the bucketeers. All
| that was necessary was for them to
"go to it"
| Swindlc in Marks.
This was the famous swindle in
| the sale of options on German MARKS.
For years there had been market
| in New York for puts and calls on
stocks. That market gave a banking
clique with headquarters In berln
! the foundation on which to start
| giant fraud.
Brokers' who had long been han
ding puts and calls on stocks that
4 had an active market on either tne
New York Stock Exchange or on the
curb suddenly began to receive orders
from various quarters for puts ana
calls on German marks and, Just as
suddenly, those brokers found that
| there were many people VINO were
! ready to fill those orders.
! In the light of later developments.
lit was revealed rather clearly that
| the main source of demands for the
options was from local representa-
tives of the Berlin banking clique,
| which now appeared to be dominant
| in German banking and manufactur-
| ing. and also that the supply of those
| options was coming from much the
| same sources. In other words, cam
paign had been very carefully lald
| out by which a market was being
| made" in the options.
A Market Campaign.
i 1t soon became apparent to students
/ of market making" that an enort
was being made to create the idea
that a tremendous buying demand
from many sources existed Tor the
calls on German marks. The natural
| inference of the public would there
| fore be that huge buying demand
4 existed for the marks themselves
/ With such an impression created, the
| sale of German marks could OF
| course, be facilitated.
| In other words. the German bank
| ing groups who were out to create a
J market for German marks around the
| levels which then existed for that
currency-about 4 cents to the mark
! (some operators had. in fact, started
| operations a few cents higher) as
lcompared with present prices of about
| 10000 marks to the dollar-went at
! their work in much the same way as
| does the promoter of a stock for
which a large distribution is to be
| sought. mainly through the mediums
of manipulation and tipping"
The Berlin banicsng CLIQUE: which
| stocks, knew that the same element
of human "hoggishness" which applies
| with regard to stocks and induces
people to buy stocks on margin in
stead of outright also. applies with
more readily attracted to options than
to the marks themselves because,
with a comparatively small amount
of capital, they could carry a line of
calls on a number of marks vastly
! in excess of the amount of marks
| which the same capital would pur-
chase.
Queer Lot of Agents.
| Through agent here. the United
| States mails were flooded with litera-
ture setting forth the wonderful out
| look for the German mark. Some of
these agents, although German or
| German had been identi
| fed with many questionable American
promotions, and had been associated
with notorious American get-rich-
quick men.
1t would have been hard for the
banking swindlers in Berlin to have
found anywhere a gang of reprobates
better suited to the enormous free
booting that was planned OF these
German agents and the American
! criminal element with which they had
been associated more will be told
| later.
Houses with German names put out
| beautiful embossed pamphlets, in
| which attention was drawn to the
manner in which the currencies of
| other. great nations had recovered in
! the years which followed the ending
of great wars in which those nations
! had been engaged. Stress was laid
on the Industrious character of the
German people. Stress was laid on
| the fact that Germany should rea-
| Sonably be expected to do everything
possible to re-establish herself in the
eyes of the world in order to regain
trade which she had lost during the
war, and that toward that end strenu-
Gus efforts would be made toward re-
establishing the German mark on the
basis of exchange that existed before
the war
Noted American financial writers. in
giving attention to the foregoing, ex-
pressed in full sincerity the opinion
that. according to every economic
law. the mark was selling at levels
too low.
Demand Develops
The tremendous market king
&C fn WI