Current Situation

Midsummer dullness is falling on the markets, and a stability based upon considerable steady activity now reigns in most departments of business. Leading business men, after spending July looking in the financial heavens for signs and portents but detecting nothing particular, are now resigning themselves to brief vacations.

It is the consensus of opinion that the stockmarket should give the first warning signal of coming deflation, and that the key to the stockmarket lies in the money market. But the money situation is still unique in U. S. history; its unused resources of credit are still so great that it is as important to determine what Federal Reserve officials think of things as to juggle with endless statistics. At present glance, it seems likely that the top of the bond market has been reached, and that money rates will firm slightly this fall.