38 BULLETIN 1479, U. S. DEPARTMENT OF AGRICULTURE 
day, their trading amounted to 7,152,000 bushels bought, or 7.6 per 
cent of the total purchases, and 3,351,000 bushels sold, or 3.6 per cent 
of the total sales. Included in the total figure of 93,439,000, however, 
is an item of over 10,000,000 sold by the two largest traders or over 
10 per cent of the total sales for the day. Also included in the total 
is a large element of scalping trades and a smaller volume of spreading 
and hedging trades. For the period covered in the investigation of 
the 1925 May wheat future from January 2 to April 18, 1925, the 
fraction of the total volume of trading made by the groups represent- 
ing the small and medium-sized speculative traders was 45 per cent 
of the total volume. Using this as a basis of estimate, the business of 
these two firms constitutes a sample of over 12 per cent of the total 
trading. As a conservative estimate these two firms handle at least 
10 oe cent of the total volume of small or medium-sized speculative 
trade. 
Table 6 gives a summary of the number and amounts of the trades 
made through these two firms and in Table 3 of the appendix will be 
found the same information in a more detailed form. ‘Table 4 of the 
appendix shows the price changes occurring during the day. A fact 
of outstanding importance in Table 6 is that the smal! orders—job 
lots and 5’s and 10’s—constitute such a large fraction of the total 
number and amount. In pomt of numbers, over 88 per cent of the 
orders executed were for 10,000 bushels or less, 33 per cent of the 
orders were for 1,000 or 2,000 bushels, and as much as 39 per cent 
of the total number were job lots. In amount, over 53 per cent were 
for 10,000 bushels or less, while approximately 9 per cent were job 
lots. If these percentages are at all representative of the everyday 
trading of the ‘general public,” their trades are indeed small in 
separate amounts in comparison with the transactions of the leading 
professional speculators. 
TaBLE 6.—The number and amounts of trades! in the 1926 May wheat future 
made through two clearing members of the Chicago Board of Trade on March 
1, 1926 
Purchases Sales Total trades 
| 
Size of trade Per cent Per cent 
Number| Amount) Number} Amount} Number] (cumu- | Amount} (cumu- 
lative) lative) 
Job lots: 1,000 bus. 1,000 bus. 1,000 bus. 
1,000 bushels each _------- 230 230 73 73 303 | ~2136 303 2.9 
2,000 bushels each -------- 109 218 52 104 161 Bill 322 6.0 
3,000 bushels or over - ---.. 57 200 31 107 | 88 39.3 307 8.9 
Motalee sis oa 396 648 | 156 284 552 39.3 932 8.9 
Regular lots: 
5,000 bushels each ____---- 335 1, 675 110 550 445 71.0 25220 30.0 
10,000 bushels each _____-- 180 1, 800 70 700 250 88.9 2, 500 53.8 
15,000 bushels each -_-__-- 17 255 14 210 31 91.1 465 58. 2 
20,000 bushels each _____-- 29 580 23 460 52 94.8 1, 040 68. 2 
25,000 bushels each _____-- 12 300 6 150 18 96.1 450 72,4 
30,000 bushels each _____-- 11 330 3 90 14 97.1 420 76. 4 
35,000 bushels each _____-- 1 35 1 35 2 97.2 70 77.1 
40,000 bushels each_-_-___-- 3 120 1 40 4 97.5 160 78.6 
45,000 bushels each ____-_-- 1 45 2 90 3 97.7 135 79.9 
50,000 bushels each ______- 14 700 7 350 21 99. 2 1, 050 89.9 
55,000 bushels or over. _-- 6 670 5 390 11 100. 0 1, 060 100.0 
Mota: he eee 609 6, 510 242 3, 065 851 60. 7 9, 575 91.1 
Grandstotalaess 5-24 1, 005 7, 158 398 3, 349 1, 403 100.0 | 10, 507 100. 0 
— 
1 Does not include purchases or sales made on bids at a nominal price at the close. Does not include 
old style contracts, which amounted to less than 3 per cent of the total trading in May wheat. Does not 
include a sale by trader No. 3 of 1,750,000 bushels. 
ae. 
i) 
