108 
Wheat  Prices  and  the  World’s  Production. 
This  continuity  of  supply  throughout  the  year,  tends  to 
prevent  violent  oscillations  in  price,  for  it  is  found  that  a 
probable  or  actual  failure  of  the  crop  in  one  part  of  the  world 
does  influence  the  acreage  under  wheat  in  other  parts. 
The  wheat  situation  in  the  last  few  years  has,  however, 
borne  a very  striking  resemblance  to  that  at  the  time  of  the 
Leiter  corner.  History  has  in  fact  repeated  itself,  for  whereas 
the  figures  of  the  world’s  wheat  crop  have  been  showing  no 
great  increase,  the  demand  for  wheat  has  been  expanding  at 
a progressive  rate.  The  causes  of  this  increase  are  the  same 
as  before.  In  the  United  States  the  consumption  has  risen 
from  about  37,000,000  qr.  in  1880-83,  to  67,000,000  qr. 
in  1905-07,  and  she  is  beginning  to  import  wheat  from  Canada. 
The  town  population  of  Germany  is  rapidly  acquiring  a taste 
for  wheaten  instead  of  rye  bread,  and  her  needs  are  out- 
stripping the  growth  of  home  supply.  She  is  consequently 
becoming  a large  importer  of  Russian  wheat.  In  other 
countries  of  Europe  the  standard  of  living  is  also  rising, 
and  wheat  is  replacing  rye  and  potatoes.  Even  Japan 
and  China  are  beginning  to  consume  the  European  staple, 
though  at  present  the  consumption  is  confined  to  the  upper 
classes. 
Two  years  ago  these  factors  caused  a squeeze  in  the  world’s 
market,  and  in  the  last  two  or  three  months  of  1907  prices 
I'ose  rapidly  in  anticipation  of  a shortage.  Fortunately  for 
the  consumer,  Argentina  came  to  the  rescue  with  a bumper 
crop  which  was  harvested  in  the  spring  of  1908  and  prices 
rapidly  became  normal.  At  the  end  of  1908  there  was  a more 
serious  shortage.  Many  countries  had  short  crops,  and  the 
requirements  of  importing  countries  were  unusually  large. 
Again,  in  the  following  spring  Argentina  did  her  best,  but 
this  time  her  surplus  was  not  abnormally  large,  and  she  was 
not  able  to  make  up  the  whole  deficiency.  American  supplies 
failed  almost  entirely,  and  prices  continued  to  rise.  British 
farmers  who  had  wheat  to  sell  made  a good  profit,  and  the 
retail  price  of  bread  advanced  throughout  the  country.  The 
very  slight  fall  which  followed  Mr.  Patten’s  operations  in 
Chicago  indicates  that  the  rise  of  prices  last  year  was  almost ' 
entirely  due  to  this  world  shortage,  and  not  to  the  manipula- 
tions of  the  Chicago  Board  of  Trade.^ 
* Mr.  Patten’s  operation  was  not  a “corner”  of  the  same  magnitude  or 
importance  as  Mr.  Leiter’s  in  1898.  In  September,  1908,  wheat  for  delivery  in 
May,  1909  (May  option),  was  quoted  in  Chicago  at  86  cents  per  bushel.  By 
the  beginning  of  April,  1909,  “May  options”  were  quoted  at  127  cents  per 
bushel.  Mr.  Patten  was  popularly  supposed  to  have  caused  this  rise  by  holding 
up  fabulous  quantities  of  wheat.  He  probably  held  very  little  actual  wheat  at 
all,  but  made  a fortune  by  foreseeing  seven  or  eight  months  beforehand  that 
the  world’s  supply  would  be  short  in  the  early  summer  of  1909. 
