Current Situation

The arrival of the seasonal Summer dullness in trade, superimposed upon a period of trade and manufacturing depression, has resulted in dull and inert commercial conditions. The political Conventions have meanwhile served to distract attention from business affairs, and with the prospect of unsettled conditions in politics for the next four months, there is a tendency toward watchful waiting all along the line from producer to consumer. Wall Street, however, after several months of an uninteresting experience with meaninglessly see-sawing prices, is now getting the old-fashioned thrill that only a sudden decline in interest rates can give. Bonds and stocks with fixed or certain dividends are making "new highs" daily. Yet, on the basis that it takes something more than cheap money to produce rising markets and prosperity, investors are still gun-shy of industrial stocks for the most part. The Great God Livermore has yet to declare himself convinced that in the industrials the turn has come. But it is too much to believe that the speculative leader is unaware of the soaring investment markets, or that he has not profited somewhat thereby. It is conventional for the business cycle to begin with cheap money and rising bond prices. The return of industrial prosperity and higher industrial stock prices comes later. Just now, half Wall Street, at least, is wondering--how much later?