STOCK MARKET COUP.

Wairarapa Age, Volume XXXI, Issue 9105, 3 June 1908, Page 7

STOCK MARKET COUP.

When the French financier Rochetre was arrested recently a number of outside brokers and others interested in the stock markets, who had' been anticipating the event and had combined for that purpose, immediately sold heavily ell the stocks in which Rochette was interested, forming a sort of "bear" syndicate, with ihe intention of buying back later on to cover their sales at a price at 50 per cent, lower. Then it was that all the stocks down to a few francs each.' A few days later, to the surprise and astonishment of the "bear" syndicate, the various stocks in which Rochette was inteicst»d began to improve in price, and at the settlement recently the "bears" found themselves short in their calculations by a sum ot £120,000, so that, instead of making a large profit, they have lost heavily. It is now stated on good authority that the originator of the move which led to the unexpected improvement in price was Mme. Rochette herself. Immediately on hearing of her husband's arrest she returned from Biar- , ritz to Paris and met some of her husband's business associates. She learned of the "bear" selling, and at oi ce decided on action. She realised on everything she could, and with £loo,ouo thus obtained gave orders to numerous jobbers, outside brokers, and other market intermediaries to buy for cash < n "apot" terms for immediate delivery as many of each of the principal different kinds of shares as the means at her disposal would allow. Slie devoted special attention to the shares which were most threatened. While the newspaper reporters were hunting for her high and low, she sat ,in a little office for four , hours every day giving her orders for the day's market, and anxiously watching the rise of prices on the impulsion of her cash purchases. The result became clear in the discomfiture of the "b?ar" syndicate, and when she.met her husband out- ' side the investigating magistrate's ' room and threw herself weeping into his arms, she was able to tell him that she had made £120,000 for him through her shrewdness in forcing the "bear" syndicate to deliver to her agents at a much higher price than they had sold, while at the same time her action had tended to allay and limit the shareholders' panic.