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Show I What The Hills Gave Up In 1910 mJ?L Hj rTTIIERB bavo been times in the past year when H J devotees of the mining stock market were com- H pelled to treat themselves with the mental sug- H gestlon that the world cannot possibly get along H without metal, and is using more of it all the time, H to rid themselves of the impression that stocks H were going to be worthless and "To Let" signs H hung out at all the mines. H The midsummer slump that used to be a tradi H ( tion in this part of the country, but was discoun- H tenanced by a series of hot weather booms, reap- H peared with all its ancient severity. Business H reached its lowest ebb in August, when sales on I the Salt Lake exchange covered only 986,586 H shares, and in September, when the value of the I shares sold totaled but $260,112.62. I Compared with January's two million shares at H x $700,000, or March's 1,680,000 shares at $608,000, H this was an enormous decline. No wonder the H brokers were discouraged! Following the drop to I 1,347,000 shares worth only $397,000 in April their H commissions would scarcely induce a bread wagon H to slow up in a blind alley. Following is a com- H parison of the business this year with last year, H December being estimated: Month. Shares. Value. H January 3,493,639 $1,634,149.31 H February 5,024,190 1,742,773.45 March 3,483,824 1,842.723.12 H April u 3,362,315 2,284,193.48 May 3,045,395 2,113,161.67 H June 7 2,446,711 1,363,553.21 H July 1,930,712 1,392,705.02 i August 1,999,544 1,293,649.56 September 2,803,276 1,066,412.63 Id October 2,464,491 863,488.37 I ' November 2,263,852 903,524.03 l December 2,020,293 756,300.10 Total 34,344,242 $17,256,633.95 I Month. Shares. Value. H January 2,096,600 $697,897.30 I f February 1,558,654 466,013.84 March 1,680,487 608,792.57 H I April 1,347,720 396,982.82 V May 1,099,545 352,360.27 Hf June 1,347,879 334,144.96 H J July 986,566 382,647.98 J August 1,339,510 396,480.04 K September 1,010,151 260,112.62 B October 1,402,427 282,966.00 W November 1,292,605 314,297.47 1 December 1,419,210 309,951.00 ' Total 17,177,254 $4,802,646.86 H The statistician has to go back to 1906 to find H a year in which fewer shares changed hands and H to 1905 for a lower record of monetary transac- Ha tions Is it strange that some have scented a uni- H & versal boycott of mining stocks by speculators and H f investors? And yet it is not so difficult to find a H$ bright side to the iituation. The change for the 2 which fht appeared in October and which H applies both to prices and to business, has been B . well sustained. The net result of the year is a H i repetition of the old lesson that mining, when con-H con-H i ducted along conservative lines, as in Utah, is the H j cleanest form of speculation and one of the safest Hj I forms of investment; that the pursuit of earth's Hf hidden treasures never grows stale and that good H mining stocks as well as good mines "come back" H J perennially despite the transient allurements of Hj 4 other offerings. H In the end the prosperity of any mining stock H1 market rests on the value of the mineb there rep- H resented. In the Utah mining field there have H i been no spectacular developments in 1910. There H' have been gains and losses" which" tenTied"" to bal- anco one another, with a slight preponderance of gains due to the maintenance of earnings and the steady progress of development. The dividend total for 1910 will exceed that of a year ago by at least $764,856. It is too early to estimate the sum of the metal production, but it is sure to show an increase in copper and zinc, which may, or may not, offset a loss in the production pro-duction of silver and gold. Stockholders will have received by the end of the year more than $8,000,000 in profits. That the dividends show a gain instead of a loss is to the credit of the camp of Bingham, and its disseminated disseminat-ed copper miners. The Utah Copper company has saved the day by increasing its disbursements from a million and a third to four million and a half dollars. This table will make clear the status of the dividend payers: Company. 1909. 1910. Boston-Sunshine $ 13,500 $ 8,000 Colorado 960,000 300,000 Daly-West 162,000 162,000 Grand Central 20,000 45,000 Iron Blossom 480,000 200,000 Little Bell 15,000 60,000 Silver King Coalition 937,500 187,500 Sioux Consolidated . .' 573,342 89,448 Uncle Sam Con 50,000 45,000 United States S. R. & M... 2,403,440 2,403,440 Utah Consolidated 600,000 150,000 Utah Copper 1,319,500 4,647,750 Victoria 5,000 10,000 West Mountain Placer 2,500 2,500 Totals $7,543,782 $8,310,638 The regular December dividend of one or two of these companies has not been declared, and there is a possibility that some other company will slip in a small payment before the end of the year, but the estimate will cut close. The Boston-Sunshine and West Mountain Placer dividends divi-dends were in liquidation of their debts to stockholders stock-holders and will not be repeated next year. The Utah Copper, Grand Central, Little Bell and Victoria Vic-toria have increased their profits. Decreases are shown by the Colorado, Iron Blossom, Silver King Coalition, Sioux, Uncle Sam and Utah Consolidated. Consol-idated. The Daly-West and United States break even. No new dividend payer has been added to the list during the last year although the Moscow and the Utah Mine companies have shown symptoms of joining the column. Both are likely to be found there next year. One of the most Important occurrences of the last twelve months was the absorption of the Boston Bos-ton Consolidated at Bingham by the Utah Copper company, which gave the latter's steam shovels full swing over the whole mountainside and did away with a troublesome boundary line. The Utah Copper also came into possession of the Boston mill at Garfield which, with its own mjll, has been remodeled to treat twice as much ore as formerly. The Ohio Copper company has met with great success in the operation of the first section of Its copper concentrating plant, and is mining and milling its rock at about half the estimated es-timated expense. Its business affairs, however, are in a very unsatisfactory condition. The other active companies at Bingham have done exceedingly exceed-ingly well and several new enterprises are under way. Tintic's most notable developmpents have occurred oc-curred along the north end of the district. The Uncle Sam has opened up larger bodies of ore tban it has had in sight for years, and the May-Day, May-Day, after being given away on the stock exchange, ex-change, has returned to favor because of increasing increas-ing earnings. Some of the best ore ever shipped "fromTIntlc has been raised from the deep levels of the Chief Consolidated. Farther north the Scranton has exposed great bodies of zinc. Along the east side of the mountain the depletion deple-tion of the silver-lead ore bodies and the appear- ' ance of an excess of silica has had a disastrous effect upon earnings. Colorado, Iron Blossom and Sioux Consolidated have all been affected. While the Iron Blossom has had unexpected success in discovering silver, gold and copper ore in its south workings and has developed a large tonnage of it, the concurrent appearance of silica has made the product unwelcome at the smelters. A raise in treatment charges cut the net profit to $2 a ton and caused the company to curtail shipments and take up a mill project which is still under consideration. con-sideration. Far Eastern Tintic has not only failed to bring in new mines, but has lost one of the shippers it ' formerly boasted, the East Tintic Development. Nevertheless the section has not been discredited and operations there have received new impetus in the last quarter of the year. The older section of Tintic is crowding close on the water level. At the Centennial-Eureka arrangements ar-rangements have been completed for the unwater-ing unwater-ing of the depths by means of a tunnel and a powerful pow-erful pumping plant. At Park City the Silver King Coalition has devoted de-voted the greater part of the year to the Improvement Improve-ment of the physical condition of its property, the opening of new ground and the installation of an electric tramming system. The improvements are now finished. An old squabble between the Daly-Judge Daly-Judge and the Daly-West has been settled and there will be no further difficulty in extending the Ontario drain tunnel. The Daly-West, Ontario and Daly have under consideration a merger which will be followed by the erection of a big mill at the portal of the tunnel. The Alta district, as the Big and Little Cottonwood Cotton-wood sections are called, has been the scene of three remarkable strikes during the year. These were made upon the Cardiff, Columbus Extension and Utah Mines Coalition properties. The South Columbus has joined forces with the Alta-Hecla as the South Hecla Mining company. Instead of resuming dividends, as forecasted, the Columbus Consolidated has been forced to levy two assessments assess-ments to stave off foreclosure proceedings, and Is engaged in a severe struggle with a flow of water recently encountered in drifting to the east. It has been reported that an eastern brokerage firm has agreed to finance a merger of Alta properties for the purpose of running a drain tunnel to tap the camp at least 400 feet below its deepest workings. work-ings. Some good strikes of silver-lead and zinc ore in the Cedar-Talisman, the rejuvenation of the New-house New-house Mines & Smelters company as the South i Utah Mines & Smelters company, the discovery ' of ore in commercial quantities by the Hub and the debut of the Moscow as a regular: producer, are among the events of the year in Beaver county. The King David, Beaver Carbonate and Indian Queen have been forced to close down for lack of money to continue development. An up-to-the minute Institution was added to Utah's smelter equipment this year when the International In-ternational plant at Tooele was" blowfl in. ft lias a capacity of 2,000 tons of copper, gold or silver ore a day, and can operate, probably, at less ex pense than any other smelter in the United States The general opinion is that the Glroux" ores" from Ely and the Nevada-Utah product from Pioche will be handled at this- tflant. The American Smelting & Refining- plant at Garfield has added 300 tons to its daily capacity during the last half of the year and has taken over the business of the Yampa smelter at" Bingham, which is now cold. Since January there has been a great increase of interest in the oil field in Southeastern Utah. A score of drilling outfits are operating there and a dozen or more wells are ready to yield a fine quality of paraffin oil as soon as a railroad or a pipe line affords them an outlet to market. . i It will bo seen from this brief resume, from W which mention of numerous promising small camps is necessarily omitted, that the mining industry in Utah is in a very healthy condition and is shaping shap-ing up for larger and more economical production with bigger earnings as a natural consequence. From a speculative standpoint the outlook is far more pleasing than had the year been one of high prices and record business on the exchange. The very fact that trading has been below the normal and quotations depressed implies an early return to normal conditions with the concomitant increase in activity, price uplift and opportunities for profit-making. |
