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Show I The Market and the Mines Noon in Boston- Evening in Utah! Midnight in Nevada! The mining stock market has followed fol-lowed the course of the sun across the continent during the week past. Prices in the east have heen near the meridian; at Salt Lake they have touched the horizon and over in Nevada have gone well toward the nadir. Even the best astrologers astrol-ogers are somewhat put out by the phenomenon and have no explanation as to why demand should vary with the longitude. tyC That business here has been less active is true only in a comparative sense. While it has not kept up to the highest pressure of recent weeks, it has been better than during the corresponding corre-sponding period of last year by more than a hundred hun-dred per cent. Nor has the movement of prices all been downward. While there have been some declines for cause, there have been some notable nota-ble advances for cause. The veracious chron-I chron-I icier of the week's history turns again to Park City for situations that will enliven his tale. I There Silver King appears in a triple role; first as an abandoned infant on the doorstep of the H stock exchange, where it is hawked about for $28 a share, then as a prudent prince reducing the 8 allowance of his subjects from G2 2-3 to 33 1-3 B cents a share, and, finally, as a prodigal monarch H spending thousands for new dominions. 5 iC H The fact that a share like the King should I drop from $70 to $28 on sales of less than 1000 is one of the things that make Brokers' Row look H like Queer street. It would have qpst comparatlve-B comparatlve-B ly little for the stockholders to take in these Hj shares and sustain the market. The reduction I of the monthly dividend from $100,000 to $50,003 H does not, in itself, account for the willingness of owners to part with their stock at $28. An H annual rate of 33 1-3 cents a share would pay. nearly 15 per cent on $28, and 10 per cent on $40. I Ten per cent is a remunerative Investment oven I in mining, and if Silver King can guarantee a"1 I continuance of the present dividend the stock should command $40 a share. The conclusion is I irresistable that the Silver King management is H in shallow water and doubts whether it will make I the open sea or be driven hard aground. The H most hopeful view the public can take of the matter is that the allegations of Plaintiff Mc- Grogor are true and the King ore body really H continues into Magnolia-St. Louis ground. So long as the ore remains its individual ownership H is not a question in which the people of Utah generally are concerned. H j j j I In the last few days Mr. McGregor has taken H . steps to force the issue. He has asked the court for an injunction restraining the Silver King from prosecuting work in the Magnolfa-St. Louis, and has made specific accusations of trespass. The defendants will be obliged to close down their mine altogether or prove to the satisfaction of the court that no ore is being taken from the property of the plaintiff company. The rejoinder of the Magnolia-St. Louis further makes an emphatic em-phatic denial of the statement in the answer that the Silver King is the rightful owner of the ore taken from Magnolia ground. ti? & Under ordinary circumstances the purchase of the Woodside group and the fifteen 'Ferry claims on Treasure hill, by the Silver King, would occasion oc-casion no comment, but that the deal should be made immediately after a 50 per cent reduction in dividend and during the pendency of a big damage suit adds to the mystery of a peculiar situation. The purchase price is kept a secrot, but it is announced that the investment adds twenty-four claims to the territory of the Silver King. & & In sharp contrast with the decline of Silver King is the uninterrupted progress of Little Bell toward the full dignity of bonanzahood. It is no longer doubted that this property will soon take a conspicuous position among the great producers of the state, and it may even aspire to the throne which the Silver King must sooner or later vacate. va-cate. " Little Bell is one of the three shares that advanced in price in the teeth of a bear mnflcet, opening at $11.87 1-2 and closing the week which ended Wednesday afternoon at $12.75. It left Daly-Judge nearly a dollar behind. i? Columbus Con. Is the second of the trio which successfully breasted the tide of liquidation. And In this connection the shorts are said to have, suffered a grievous disappointment. Two months ago, when the stock was being hammered by the bear interests, the management came to Its support sup-port by taking up the offerings. In many cases the purchases were made at sixty days delivery So far as the buyer was concerned, the transactions transac-tions combined the wisdom of the serpent with the liarmlessness of the dove. But the vendors were not so ingenuous. They shrewdly calculated calcu-lated that the management did not have the ready cash with which to take up the stock and would bo obliged to sell other shares in order to meet Us obligations. The whole tribe of shorts, armed with clubs, hammers and brickbats, lay in ambush, am-bush, but to their disgust the Columbus stock did not come down the line. The disappointed bears had to go into the market and plank down better than $7 a share to deliver goods they had con- tracted at $G'or under. The Columbus manage- 8B meat had the money, and as no one has been 'IH Sandbagged lately, it is presumed that it was ob- 8 tained honestly. The buyers not only secured B several thousand shares of the stock for a dollar '8 less than the present quotations, but they se- liH cured it at a time when every indication be- speaks a considerable advance. The roads have '8 been oponed and 1500 tons of $40 ore can be iJ speedily transformed into dividends. At the same time the men who have been road-building Bf will get busy poking into the ore bodyon the :H 300-foot, which is now virtually opened. Of the third impregnable stock, Uncle Sam, H little can be said except that it began the week ;H at 40 and went to 41 1-2 at the close. Through jH the remainder of the list liquidation ran riot. jH New York fell from 2G to 22 1-2; Lower Mam- moth, hit by an unexpected 5-cont assessment, jH staggered back to 29 from 3G 1-2; Carisa dropped from 30 to 2S; the forces that have supported May Day threw up their hands, and when the 'H earthquake was over the share had fallen from 25 to 18. Even Daly-Judge went off from $12 to $11.G2 1-2, while the Nevadas suffered in propor- jH tion. Montgomery Mountain opened at 53 and jH closed at 40. Mohawk was marked down from $1 iH to 94 cents. Beck Tunnel was saved from the 8 slaughter only by timely backing at the eleventh iH .hour, whon it was restored to its opening price, $1.12 1-2. With the general slump in prices the .H business was greater than might be imagined. The shares sold numbered 248.G50, as against ;8 278,945 for the previous week, and brought $208,- H 554, as against $182,780.27. .H , Dr. Wiley declares that mint is a "noxious fl weed." He must take his straight. :B |
