Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1931-05-18
STOCKS CONTINUE
NEW LOW LEVELS
Steady Stream of Offerings
Push Prices Steadily
Downward.
BY GEORGE T. HUGHES.
Special Dispatch to The Star.


NEW YORK, May ia steady
stream of offerings pouring into the
stock market depressed prices to new
low levels for the bear movement to-
day. The decline was singularly with
cut feature. It consisted of a monoton-
Gus succession of new lows unrelieved
by rallies and unaccompanied by the
rumors that generally spread through
the street on occasions of this kind.
The two industrials on which at
tention had been concentrated all OF
last week, United States Steel and
American Can, finally broke through
par. the latter in the first hour and
steel after a futile attempt to avoid its
fate. OF the two, American Can was
the weaker, but steel displayed no rally
ing power and the spectacle OF these
one-time favorites SO severity debated
deepened pessimism as to the market
outlook.
Prices for railway shares melted
away. The list of new lows included
practically all the active stocks. Be-
fore noon New York Central was under
"a, off more than points, Baltimore
& Ohio under Sc, off about the same
amount; Delaware a. Hudson down be-
tween and points, New Haven with
loss Of as much and so on. Southern
Pacific, whose dividend meeting is sched-
uleu lUT bIilS NtSh, DlOhC POhlN9 bC
fore meeting any effective support
An interesting incident accompanied
the trading in the higher-priced rail-
way shares. Atchison appeared on the
tape at $50 BID, offered at 159. Four
times thereafter a bid and asked price
was printed, with the offered price
steadily reduced and the bid price adj
vanced until finally 1000 shares sold
at l54LA, a new low since 1926, and
l. q NIt,4c Ia1y
Norfolk e. Western slumped s points
to a new low about the same time
and Pennsylvania broke through its
old resistance point, while a little later
acute weakness developed in Great
Northern preferred. Some OF this may
have been due to short selling, but real
liquidation must have played part.
Tape watchers had another shock
when American Telephone 81 Telegraph
went to its new low on fair sized
offerings OF course, no one imagines
that there will be any change in the
American Telephone dividend. The
only argument the sellers had was that
the price-earnings ratio was too high
for these times. Two years ago Tele-
phone would have been thought to be
on the bargain counter so points high
er than today's quotation.
The market dipped 70 still lower
levels in the afternoon ana tnen naTo-
ened. 1t was learned that there had
been heavy selling from London, but
whether it represented liquidation or
speculative commitments for the de-
cline was uncertain. In some quarters
the British offerings were connected
with the international situation in
general and in others it was said that
specific difficulties In London were re-
sponsible, but there was nothing au-
thoritative to be had on this side.
General Electric broke through 40.
selling at the lowest for the present
shares, and weakness developed in the
utilities, including Consolidated Gas
and North American Co. American
Telephone & Telegraph under III was
the lowest since 1927. Selling spread
to lower priced stocks, such as Phillips
Petroleum and United States Rubber
and while losses were not large because
of the already depressed market value,
there was little support.
(Copyrieht, 1912