By cox tesy of Swan, Cuivertson & Fritz The most important event of the week during the current peried under review—President Roosevelt's declaration of an unlimited national emergency failed to disturb the present dullness in the market. and changes in stock prices on Wall Street were very narrow. Rail equities reached the lowest levels in almost three months, as the prospective employee's wage demands acted as a depressant. Stock prices on Monday dropped to the neigh-"bourhood of the year's lows due to a combination of the latest war news, and precautionary selling prior to Roosevelt's speech. Although the latter checked any broad advance of the list on Tuesday, the market was ancovraged by the sinking of the Bismarck and the French declaration not to give up their fleet. President Roosevelt's speech had no undue effect on the market on Wednesday since most of its implications had already been discounted, Aircraft shares, however, were strong, possibly due to the President's request for an additional $3,000,000.000 for airplanes. In view of the impending holiday, traders remained on the sidelines on Thursday, although firmness was encouraging in the face of the British retreat in Crete, and the broader indications of American in-valvement in ware.
Commodities, as gauged by the Dow-Jones 11 commodity index. showed little general change, but some individual raw materials were greatly affected by Government price controls. Wheat futures at Chicago declined over 4 cents per bushel, even though President Roosevelt signed the 85 per cent. parity bill, because of fears over offerings of free wheat, due to limited storage space. July corn was practically unchanzéd, Cotton improved as a result of the parity bill. Rubber futures declined sharply, owing to the increase in margin to $1,200 per contract, and apprehension over a possible' price ceiling. There was heavy liquidation in hides on the Washington announcement of the price ceiling basis of 15 cents, and increase in margin to $700 per contract. World sugar futures imořoved in a quiet market, which was featureless.
The steel. mágázine "Iron Age" foresees a further congestion of steel orders dre to the several million tons of new defence requirements. It is expected that in order to prevent an impasse, Washington will adopt promptly ' mandatory priorities. Estimates of earnings for railroads for the half year are almost equal to the figure for the entire year of 1940. The backlog of American Car Foundry on April 30, was placed at $100,000,000, with earnings estimated at $5 per share, Automobile sales
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