Show iftDE OF t PAST WEEK The Volume of Business Continues to Increase I STOCKS CUT NO FIGURE + DID NOT INTERFERE WITH I PRODUCTION INDUSTRY 4 Large Decrease In Failures Over Those of Last Year Drop In I Stock Prices the Result of a Purely I Pure-ly Speculative CaseOverbought Condition of Market I 4 New York May I2R G Dun Cos weekly review of trade will say To speak truly of business this week one must free the mind of stocks for a severe decline in manufacturing manufac-turing stocks has created an Impression Impres-sion that It has some relation to productive ductive Industry but It has none There was no change in the money market worth mentioning anjl the volume of business shown by payment through the principal clearing houses was 715 cent than in 192 the per larger year of greatest prosperity hitherto which Is more than double the gain anybody considered possible a year ago Never of ever before reaching a quarter a million tons per week the Iron manufacture man-ufacture reports May 1 an output of 250093 tons weekly which with 54455 decrease in warrant and furnace stocks indicates a consumption of 37322 tons daily against 37330 In March 34814 in i I February and SGS34 In January The average for four months is 38027 tons daily against 32209 last year An increase in-crease of 16 per cent in the year would be less Interesting if consumption a year ago were not far beyond anything previously realized Yet proposed combinations com-binations hindered largely orders in bars and sheets while the structural business is a heavy as ever in somali lots with bid contracts about t come i at Chicago for the drainage canal and the plate business to big for all the works to handle invitesno consolidation consolida-tion the Chicago and Philadelphia works being behind in deliveries and Pittsburg works troubled by demands for 4000 tons vessel plates and 400U more close ahead for the government docks at Algiers Only pig iron advanced ad-vanced Bessemer 50c and gray forge 25c at Pittsburg and local pig 30c at Chicago I In minor metal tin declined at London Lon-don to 2523c and copper is weak at 19c for spot and 184 for futures Hides i at Chicago rose about 10 per cent with actual receipts of cattle in four months i 100000 head less than last year andover and-over 200000 smaller than in 189394 not j withstanding the gin in population j Nobody who has studied statistics can i tell wily purchases of 1000000 pounds of Australian wool for export this week following others in previous weeks should advance prices of wool nor were purchases of 3000000 pounds territory I wool by a speculator readily explainable j explain-able But it is just the time fd gOeS j gO-eS to ask all they can hope to get and just when the largest manufacturers were ready to buy only the smaller are buying Prices are said to have been I generally advanced with higher df i > mands from the interior holders but It remains a question whether sales of 10399000 pounds for the week against i 3263550 in 1892 and only a little more i in 1S97 will prove profitable The market for woolen goods is waiting wait-ing for evidences of demand whicn do not yet appeal and the delay in setting set-ting the new combinations into working order causes some hesitation I government estimates were considered I consid-ered reliable one based on entirely unknown un-known acreage of wheat and cotton would be everywhere resented Thus tvewher nte wun oinciai returns pointing to a great decrease in winter wheat production the price dropped Ic and cotton declined de-clined for options though retaining tie advance of a sixteenth for spot which was established before the government report appeared Nobody can base a sensible estimate on a statement of condition which takes no account of the acreage of winter wheat killed and abandoned The best than can b said Is that worse returns are expected in both markets s that the government report had practically no influence Failures for the week have been 1C3 in the United States against 246 last year year and 20 il l Canada against 24 last |