FINANCE AND INVESTMENT
WHATEVER fate European politics may have in store for the stock markets I feel that the City is demonstrating a wholly praiseworthy spirit of calm, which is itself a valuable adjunct to national preparedness. News such as has assailed Throgmorton Street during the past few days could not fail to bring lower prices, since it is now plain enough to all that the political situation is precariously balanced, but of actual selling there has been very little. Here and there investors who have belatedly been seized with a desire for greater liquidity have attempted to sell and there has, of course, been moderate pressure from the " bears." Taking markets as a whole, however, they have afforded really re- markable proof of their technical strength, in the sense that there are no weak speculative positions to liquidate, and of the fortitude of the general body of investors.
At this stage it is useless to try to forecast whether forti- tude will have its due reward. All that can safely be said is that nothing far short of war itself is likely to force prices substantially below current levels, either in London or New York, and that if happily war is avoided—without a break- up of the Peace Front—markets are set for a spectacular rise. To investors who have seen things through to these crisis days my advice is to keep their stocks, nor would I dissuade anybody with surplus funds available from making a modest purchase of sound equities if he or she is genuinely hopeful about politics. Already, there is evidence that some of the accumulated resources specifically reserved by large investors for " crisis buying " are being moved into the markets.
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