Financial Notes
REACTIONARY MARKETS.
ArrEn the very rapid rise of last week, it is scarcely surprising that in some directions the stock markets during the last few days should have displayed a reactionary *endency. The slump in rubber shares and the certainty that investors in that industry will have to suffer some considerable losses was not, of course, a helpful factor. The reaction, it will be noted, has not however been confined to speculative descriptions, but has extended to high-class investment securities and the stocks of English railways. Without emphasizing the point that there has probably been too great a disposition to anti- cipate an early recovery in trade, I think it is becoming in- creasingly recognized that there can be no real return to industrial activity and prosperity until some of the funda- mentals to which I have so frequently referred in these columns, namely, the extravagance in national expenditure, the consequent high taxation, and the shortcomings on the part of labour and of industrial organization alike have been more plainly faced and dealt with.
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