Atlanta tri-weekly journal. [volume] (Atlanta, Ga.) 1920-19??, 1923-12-18
SELLERS MARKET, MADE FOR HIM BY NATURE,
WHICH OFFERED CONTROL OF COTTON PRICE,
THROWN AWAY BY UNORGANIZED FARMER
7 hirty-FiVe Per Cent of Crop
Sold at Sacrifice Prices in
First Three Months Of
Season

Season
on December 10, which will re.
quire him to sell by that day
He sees cotton mount steadily,
backing and filling a little, but
gaining week by week. Deem
Der comes and the price reaches
1866. His forty cents looks like
a certainty to him. But cotton
drops on December and keeps
dropping, with minor reactions,
, till on the tenth it reaches the
bottom for the movement. Farm
er Jones has to sell his fifty
bales that day. He loses $1,000
as compared with what he
might have got nine days be
fore. He loses 5000 as com
pared with what he might have
got two days later. Yet it might
be that he was correct as to
the likelihood of forty-cent cot
ton during the season.
Whatever the course of the
market may be during the rest
Of the year, only those who
have deposited their cotton with
the cooperative association can
be assured that they will get as
much as an average price for
the season. Those who sold for
twenty-five and twenty-siX cents,
even thirty. now realize that
they have lost and lost heavily.
Those that sold for thirty-eight
cents, it may turn out, were
lucky, but can they be confident
of such good fortune in the fu-
ture? Or can they point to it
in the past?
The co-operatives avoid the
dumping seasons when the un-
organized farmers are bidding
the price down in their rush to
sell. They enable the farmer
to obtain a liberal advance pay
ment lin Georgia this year it
is $500 a bale), having means
to borrow money at low rate of
interest. They enable the farm
mer to have his cotton graded
for him, instead of for the buy
er. They give him many dollar
that otherwise would go to mid
die men of various sorts.
When managed well and in &C.
cordance with the principles I'M
der which they are chartered
they take the gamble and the
guess out of selling cotton, and
they do it without increasing. lhe
n..in - he II
public by one penny.
These associations are not
holding concerns. Should they
ever become holding concerns,
they will violate their charters
and become cotton gamblers.
They are organizations for
the sole purpose of selling cot
ton gradually, and in orderly
manner, over a period of twelve
months.
They avoid the dumping sea
son" for it is physically impos.
sible for them to sell during
that period. They then are get
ting members cotton into their
keeping, are concentrating it
into warehouses and grouping it
into lots of even grade and
staple.
A start made in this routine
work, they then are in position
to begin selling and it is their
duty to sell gradually yet stead
lily, They may think cotton is
too low and that it will go
higher. Yet they cannot be sure
of this, so they sell in accord.
ance with the absorptive atti-
tude of the market. Should it
be that cotton goes higher, they
will have plenty of cotton to
sell at that higher price. Should
cotton go lower, they will have
sold some at the higher level,
thus averaging up for their
members.
What they are in admirable
position to do is to avoid such
a tremendous dip as that shown
IN the chart from December
10. The price was 37.65 on
December 1, $188.25 a bale. The
price broke the next day and
kept falling, with minor reac-
tons, till December 10, it was
$19.75 a bale lower Then in
two days it regained a large
part OF that loss. There was
no reason for the co-ops to sell
during that ten-day decline and,
while [ have no information on
the subject, I doubt that one
bale was thrown on the market
by the associations during that
period
The eleven state associations
this year are handling some
thing less than one fifth of the
American crop. They will make
a brilliant showing for their
members just as they did last
year, even with so small a part
of the supply.
Had they controlled one-half
of the American crop this year.
their members would have reap
ed to the utmost the benefit to
all farmers that lay in a sell.
er's market created by supply
and demand
AS it is, SAL for a few lucky
men, pitifully few they are, only
the members Of the co-opera-
tives will profit by the rise of
cotton above 30 cents.
The rest solid when prices
were low and going up. The
co-ops sold little when prices
were low, sold much when
prices were high and will con
tinue to sell as the spinners
need staple.
Irglnia Postmaster
q