LONDON METAL EXCHANGE A CHAMBER OF MAGIC

Manawatu Times, Volume LIV, Issue 6811, 15 January 1929, Page 10

LONDON METAL EXCHANGE A CHAMBER OF MAGIC

Ritual of the Metal Market HOME OF MODERN GENIE From time immemorial wc have heard strange tales of the magic of the East, that mythical, mystical power which enabled the Genie of the Lamp to produce a palace in the twinkling of an eye. To-day, in the City of London, there is an even greater magical power at work. The modern genie has its home in that mysterious temple of the metals, the London Metal Exchange in ’Whittington avenue. There the ceremonies and incantations necessary to its working arc carried out. No gilded mosque this; no splendid palace of Jlarouu-al-Raschid, rich with marbles, jewels, and damasks. To the outward eye it is but an ordinary city office. No one would imagine from its somewhat dingy entrance that behind that simple portal is a vcritaole temple of mystery. Round the corner the poultry vendors shout their seasonable wares—turkeys geese, chickens. Inside, the high priests and their acolytes in metal finance arc fixing in short,terse terms, the price of tho motels, often before they are even extracted from the bosom of Mother Earth. No profane eye is allowed to look upon the ritual in this temple where the merchants and brokers gather at stated moments of the day to settle the price of our tin, copper, lead, and other metals. But what they decided day by day tulos the price of theso metals throughout the world. From , Australia to the Arctic, from Peking to the Pacific, the genie of London Exchange holds undisputed sway. At the Sound of the Bell. It is appropriate that the meetings of these merchants shall be called "rings.” Each ‘ring" is called to its incantations by the clanging of a bell.

The interested parlies, 20 to 25 in nuni bers, sit round a table. Punctually at 12 o ’clock tlic lirst cop* per "ring” is called. It lasts exactly ten minutes. Then comes the first "tin” ring. It, too, lasts ten minutes And so it goes ou. The first "ring” is used chiefly for "sounding the market.” It showi how much of each metal is on offer at home and abroad, and what the pr© vailing tone of the market is. Th« second continues the process. Thei comes the third and final "ring/* which lasts but five minutes. This it is which really settles things. , Fixing the Price. Take tin, as it is so much in the public eye. The third tin "ring” is held at 1.20. Very often it produces real excitement. Big amounts tiu, sometimes running into of tons, are then thrown on the market, and the figures which rule-at its close become the ruling price of tiu for the day throughout the world. Forthwith they are cabled all over tho earth—to Bolivia, whero the miner hews his tin from the rich lodes in the mountain sides; to Malay, where the Chinaman extracts the tin from alluvial soil; to Australia, Burma, Siam, Cornwall, and elsewhere. And on these ruling prices each and every seller in every part of the w-orld bases his calculations. The London Metal Exchange enables the seller to dispose of his production three and six months ahead and the consumer—it may bo Mr Ford with his motor factories, or the Welsh tin-plate factories, or Woolwich Arsenal—to contract for supplies next March or June. And both can do it at a price they know in advance. Far different is tho working of the London Metal exchange from the primitive change in those early days of our history, when the "shy Iberian” bartered his tin with the "crafty Phoenician” on the narrow beaches of Cornwall. For on the Metal Exchange the actual metal is never seen. But the confidence is there and the metal will appear at the time and place promised. That confidence enables the Genie of the Temple to work his wonders. > ;