May I, 1909.] 



THE INDIA RUBBER WORLD 



273 



THE 



Published on the Ist of each Month by 



INDIA RUBBER PUBLISHING GO., 



No. 393 BROADWAY. NEW YORK. 

 CARLE ADDREaS: IRWORLD. NBW YORK. 



HENRY C PEARSON, 

 EDITOR. 



HAWTHORNE HILL, 



ASSOCIATB. 



Vol. 40. 



MAY T. 1909. 



No. -2. 



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TABLE OF CONTENTS ON LAST PAGE READING MATTER. 



RUBBER PRICE CONDmONS. 



THE topic of the utmost interest in the india-rub- 

 ber industrj' to-day, and that which is most 

 considered, is the present and prospective price of 

 crude rubber. Whether tlve manufacturer be located 

 at Maiden, Manchester, Mannheim, Alelbourne, Men- 

 in, Milan, Mjondalen, Montargis, Montreal, or Mos- 

 cow, the question is ever present, as one which 

 must be taken into account in planning every detail 

 for the future. This is a fact which makes the whole 

 rubber iiulustry akin, for the price of rubber every- 

 where at any moment practically is the same, while 

 the same uncertainty exists as to what the price may 

 be to-morrow. The producers of rubber and the trad- 

 ers in rubber have troubles of their own in relation 

 to the same subject, but here we shall treat more par- 

 ticularly of the manufacturers. Where rubber prices 

 are made, or how they are made, are questions not 

 now pertinent to our purpose. The uncertainty of 

 prices is the thing, and what the consumer of rubber 

 can do about it. 



Low priced rubber is not so essential. When every 

 ^ consumer of a given grade of rubber must buy it prac- 

 ' tically from the same source, and it costs them all pre- 

 cisely the same figure, they are all on the same footing. 



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Whether the cost is 50 cents or $1 a pound, or more{<EW • 

 would be immaterial — if permanent prices could be 

 counted upon. But they cannot. The average price ' 

 at New York of fine upriver Para rubber during the 

 year 1902 was 76 cents; during 1905 it was $1.28^4; 

 since then it has been less, the figure for 1908 declining 

 to 9334 cents. This year, so far, the price fur this grade 

 has kept in the neighborhood of $1.20. When it is 

 considered that the difference between the highest 

 and lowest year prices here quoted amounts to no less 

 than $1,157.42 cents per metrical ton, and that these 

 fluctuations usually occur without warning, tiie buy- 

 ing of raw rubber by consumers approaches almost 

 a speculative basis. 



The producers of rubber in the Amazon region, far 

 from satisfied with a condition under which they have 

 no say in fixing the market price of their produce, 

 have determined upon a course of action, in which, 

 with the help of the government and of a great bank, 

 the}' mean to hold their rubber whenever prices are 

 not high enough to be attractive. Now the holding 

 of rubber anywhere is an expensive practice, when 

 storage costs are considered, insurance, interest on 

 advances — and the inevitable shrinkage in weight. It 

 is well enough to speak of rubber as being a modern 

 necessity, but there are limits to what people will pav 

 even for necessities, and manufacturers would have 

 to halt somewhere in the matter of paying advancing 

 rates on rubber, even were the Amazon region the 

 world's only source. There would be an inevitable 

 check to rising prices, due to increased production 

 and the hesitation of consumers to buy, after which 

 the banks would have to unload, with such results as 

 followed \'ianna"s state aided rubber "corner" — a fall 

 to half the former prices and loss to everybody con- 

 cerned. 



The Indi.v Rubber World, a dozen years ago, 

 printeil an article on "What Vianna Did for African Rub- 

 bers," showing that his speculative "bearing" of the 

 market for I'ara rubber opened the way largely for 

 the increased use of African grades. Nowadays, 

 African rubbers having won an established position 

 in the industry, though now ap[)arently falling off 

 in the rate of production, an important new source of 

 supplies has been developed — the Eastern plantations, 

 the product of which (Hcvea) is better calculated than 

 even the best Africans for supplanting the Amazon 

 rubber in the industry. 



Without meaning to advise our friends on the Ama- 

 zon, it would seem that their best interest lies, not in 

 forcing up prices to an artificial level, but to so im- 

 proving their business methods as to enable them to sell 

 at a profit at even lower prices than at present. Their 

 devotion to any policy gives the planters of Ceylon 

 and Malaya, backed by unlimited European capital, 

 the very encouragement which they want and most 

 need. The Eastern planters have it in their power 



