We cannot summarize in detail the proceedings of the Marconi
Committee during the week, but must mention one or two points of special importance- One is the interesting question put to Mr. Campbell, a member of the General Purposes Committee of the Stock Exchange, on Monday on the definition of "speculation." Mr. Campbell said that the Stock Exchange had a rule that a member might do invest- ment business" for a clerk or a company official, but not "speculative business." When asked if the General Purposes Committee had any difficulty in distinguishing between " investment " and "speculation," he said, "No, I think not." The witness then explained that an " investment" was mainly a purchase of stock which the purchaser paid for with his own money. Selling stock which one did not actually possess, or buying with borrowed money, was "speculation." In many cases, however, purchasers would borrow money from their brokers even when the stock they wanted was not bought as a speculation but was intended to be held as an investment. Mr. Lloyd George, of course, has argued that he bought American Marconi shares in the latter sense—with borrowed money, but never- theless as an investment. But surely the rule, which appears to be of strict application, that clerks and company officials can make "investments" only with their own money is not too strict for a Chancellor of the Exchequer. It is astonishing to us that while the Stock Exchange beano difficulty in enforcing a highly desirable restriction on clerks and officials it should be pretended that a Chancellor of the Exchequer—who should set the perfect example in all affairs of finance—may do as he pleases, and that definitions of "speculation" and "investment" are after all quite elusive and impossible.
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