Evening star., 1924-12-31
STOCK PRICES SOAR
AFTER ELECTIONS
Boom Sends Many to Highest
Mark of Year as Decem-
ber Nears Close.
TRADERS ARE SURPRISED
Magnitude of Buying Power, Fol
lowing Heavy Sales, Brings
Much Wonderment.
TRADERS ARE SURPRISED
BY the Associated Press.

| NEW YORK, December 31.--A post
election boom of unprecedented proper.
tions carried stock prices to the highes,
levels in years in the closing weeks OF
| the year.
Railroad shares were foremost In the
| advance. many Of them touching the
highest prices ever recorded Not since
| the early part of the present century
! when Hartman and Gould struggled
for the control of the leading Western
transportation systems of the country
| has Wall Street witnessed a railroad
| market OF such breadth and volume as
| took place in the last two months OF
| the year.
Flood Of Buying Orders.
| An enormous Investment demand, ap-
parently pent up for years through fear
! of adverse legislation, broke forth like
a flood in the few weeks following cleo
| tion, when 1t became apparent that the
| so-called radical bloc had lost the bal
| ance of power in Congress. that the
administration looked with favor upon
| railroad consultations and that the
roads had been successful in increas-
ing their net earnings through a re-
duction in operating costs. Tangible
evidence of this Improvement, furnished
by the resumption of dividends on stocks
of some of the Southwestern carriers
| stimulated the demand, which came
from large institutions and wealthy in
dividuals as well as a myriad of small
| investors.
| Industrials shared in the advance, the
largest gains being recorded by the Sc
curities of those companies whose
earnings gave definite indications OF
! business Improvement.
Wall Street Amazed.
| Professional traders admittedly were
| surprised by the magnitude of the
buying power, as indicated by the fact
that stocks in which they had built UP
large paper profits in the early Fall
were sold heavily in the few days fol-
lowing the election. on the theory that
| they could be repurchased at lower
| levels. The advance. however, once it
got started, was an almost perpendicu-
| lar one for about six weeks. The
market was taken away from the pro-
| fessionals, who were forced to bid for
stocks several points above what they
| sold them for in order to participate In
| the upward swing.
One of the curious features Of the
rapid advance was the fact that 1t
was accompanied by a relatively
slight increase in brokers' loans
which was construed as an Indication
that the stocks were being taken out
of the Street" and put in strong
boxes Wall street brokerage houses
actually found themselves with more
business than they could convenient
| ly handle, despite an average in
crease of IL per cent in brokerage
| commissions, which added millions of
dollars to their Golfers.
Steel Shares Erratic.
Fluctuations Of the steel shares re-
fected the course of business, the
| low state of operations reached in
mid summer forcing the Bethlehem
Steel Corporation to suspend it's divi-
dends on it's common stock. The
United States Steel Corporation paid
It's regular quarterly dividend of l 4
per cent. and an additional extra of
Is of one per cent each quarter, the
stock selling at the highest level
since 1917.
Most Of the oil shares lost ground,
caused by the overproduction OF
crude. The Pan-American Petroleum
& Transport Co., one of the largest
of the independents, cut its common
dividends in half, and several others
were forced to omit their payments
Copper shares showed signs of ac-
tivity and strength as the year closed
after a long period of relative de-
preston. due to the inability of the
producers to earn substantial profits
because of the low prices of the red
metal. and the stiff competition af-
forded by the African product. With
Europe again a large potential buyer
Of copper, the outlook for the indus
try Is one Of the best in years.
A slight falling off in production