A Gigantic Speculation.

Thames Star, Volume XIV, Issue 4384, 22 January 1883, Page 4

A Gigantic Speculation.

Astonishment has frequently been expressed that some bolder spirits among! United States stock gamblers did not play* a trick upon onr Money Market by suddenly pouncing npon a portion of our slender stock of gold. Were the stroke delirered suddenly, it could not fail to have a terrific effect, or to (each our reseryeless bankers a very wholesome lesson. It is now declared that Yanderbilt is about to try this game. He is alleged to be negotiating Ihe sale in -of such an amount of; United States Fours as will seriously at 4 feet the value of the- exchange, and such a proceeding is quite in his power. He must be the largest individual holder of United States Bonds in existence, since the bulk pf the 7,000,000 sterling odd realised by the sale of New York Central shares in the London market is commonly supposed to have been thus invested. But we doubt whether he meditates such an attack on our credit. Had he done, so the ! news of his intentions would not hare leaked out. beforehand. More than half the effect of a raid upon the gold in the Bank of England such as this implies would arise, from its unexpectedness. Once let the British public know that the outflow of gold is only a gambler's stroke, and that public will philosophically say, "The gold will soon come back." Vanderbilt, besides, can hardly afford to play a game of this order. His stake in the prosperity of the United States is far too great, and he knows, or ought to know, that a crisis here would do us much less harm in the long run then it would do America and the stocks Vanderbilt holds. The idea of " cornering" gold in London is, jn short, much more in the way of Gould's tactics than of Vanderbilt's.— Pall Mall Gazette.