FORTUNES WON AND LOST IN A DAY

Taranaki Daily News, Volume LII, Issue 115, 12 June 1909, Page 4

FORTUNES WON AND LOST IN A DAY

.MILLIONS .MAM IN"I'ORNERS.'' ■■Conier" .is merely anotiicr name for a I, list or monopoly. One man, a hrm. ,„■ a svndivate of linns a.riang.' th""' wilili a view to controlling the whole of a. certain commodity, such a* n .'at. wfii.'il. or cotton, for instance. U tii'.'V siv.'eewl in obtaining this moil"polv, "then Ulu-y can cruate a scarcity whWh caanses the prices to rwe, ami enn'blus them to ultimately sell out at huge prCiliU. lit U by this means chat Mr. J., A. Patten U..V celilijiiated Uh'icago liuaucier, ma,!,. ,proilit at the Kite of, .UUO.UUU a day recentlv. through "coi'iieiing' many niiilion hiu.-'hv'..> of wlhea.t. The eonse(iiuiivie wus thol !tlhe;-inaui in the street" hud to pay more for his (bread, although Mr. Matlcn maintains Uiat it was the ,-iho'itage of Hue crop and unfavorable weatllfer comlifcions wliitJi made the prices of Hour land wheat go up, mid that lie was simply shrewd enough to take advantage of'that circumstance. THE t'ITHSBUIM; BREAD KINGS. And while -Mr. fatten hats been busy in ito Chicago wheat "pit," .Messrs. Ward and 'Evtvnh', the bread kings of Pittsburg, 'hia.ve 'been inaugurating a new loin-puny, capitalised at .111,000,000, which will proSraily "corner" the bakery trade. This new company is said to : ~ave aci|uired large .wiheat areas in the West, tind will Ik able to obtain its supplies wMioiit the inteiventioii of the ■ mtddileman. In fact, the new couwhaLJon will grind its own wheat ami .-nn. its own imti.hlncry, from the -w-he-tt-j • Held* to the bakehouse, and make a : strong light to control the whole East- ; ern market. Wlu'ther they will succeed or not :u| : anoliher matter, for Hifese attempts at ' "i'o.nii'l'ing" are ofU'ii attended with disastrous results. lli-aders may re- ' niember how Mr. Joseph Leitcr, a brotheir of the late Lady Curzon, endeavored to establish a wheat "corner'' ■ ten years ago, miscalculated, ami on i>c- ! count of the slump in prices found himself with 33,000,0110 of wiheat on i hand, and lost 1,500,000 dollars' in a few hours,

LOSSES AND GAINS. It is true that M,r. E. I'. Hutchinson, familiarly known as "Old Hutch," got complete' control of (lie wheat market in 1888; ami, bv buyim.' at te a bushel and selling' at 'ills, 'made an enormous fortune; but when, two years lal.T, those verv shrewd men,, Mr. Mai-kay and Mr." Flood, cornered 11,000,009 bnishels, they were glad to escape with a loss of ir>oo,ooo. in the 'seventies Messrs. Lyon and Co. dropped £2,000,000 over their "corner'' in wheat; while ill 1887 Edward Harper, in a wheat deal on the Chicago Exchange, lost £700,001). An American syndicate some lime ago createiil a "corner" in .biscuits—capital £11,000,000! lletween Salt bake City on tii«' iwest, Portland on the east, St. Paul on like iiorlib, and New Orleans on the south—'an area of several thousand squ;atf'c miles —no pei's'nn was'a,lilc to cat a biscuit without paying tribute to this commercial' octopus. COTTON "CORNERS."

"We 'have not been without "corn.;r" sensations in this country (says a Home paper), and in 1881 an attempt was made in Liverpool to 'Vomer" cotton, tire looms in Lancashire being stopped by way o'f counteraction. The "corner" came to an end in n low days, Mr. Morris Ranger, a great cotton speculator, failing two years later and causing much disaster. This was the first of sclera',' cotton "corners" attempted in Liverpool during the 'eigllities, all of I which proved unsuccessful. America, however, is the land of the most notable trusts' and "corners," for

Americans are never ha.ppy unless the gambling fever is coursing through their ve'i.,. Aiiout th" time that Mr. Letter tried to "cornel'" the world's wheat i-Aip-ulv. m gigantic milk trust, with a capital of eiIOO.OOO, furnished .rlhielly by British s'pecu.'ators, was projected in New York City, while about the same tima a liniU-'h-Americiin Corporation obtained, practical control cif the fisheries of the grea& Canadian lakes, thunks to a trust with a ea'pita.l wf £1,000.000. The countless million's o'f iis/h disporting in tho waters of these mighty lakes can only do so by permission of these monopolists. CUIHOI'S The modern: history of steel and oil, of course, provide;; some of the most striking examples of the power of trusts and combines, and such men ils Mr. Rockefeller and Mr. Andrew Carnegie owe their millions praiftic-ally to the "cornering" oif the markets on the other side of the herring-pond. There are some ji'iiiu-iing 'features in the history of "comers," and some curious commercial enterprises have been suggested of late years. It is only two years ago tilrat a group of New' York finniK-icrs thought out ,a scheme for "coniering" the output of the 'world's Bibles, 'jiliey armmigcd that all the great prilllinj,' and distributiirg houses should combine, 4 hus reducing the cost of production, administration, ami distriliution to a minimum. An all-rouiul increase of 40 per cent, in prices was to he introduced, sind enormous profits \vm< estimated, lint people in, this country refused to have anything to do with' the idea, and tlius an nma/jiig American s'chomo was brougllit to an end—at least, svi far as iuternational business was concerned.

PARROT AXD MONKEY TRUST. 'lt was reported in 1900 that ,thc waters of the .lonian ilind 'been "cornered," a certain American colonel ha,ving obtained from lihe Turkish Government the exclusive concession to export the water of this famous river. Indeed, there seems no ilimit to the "cornering" propensities of the Amcrfcmi financier; and. amazing though it may seem, a' combine was actually formed two or three years ago, witfli a capital of £IOO.OOO, to "corner" monkeys, parrots anil nil cage pete. '