ABSTRACT
There are times when foreign countries desire loans more than at others, and there are times when money is sought more largely for the formation or extension of trading companies than at others. The securities publicly dealt in are divided into two classes, those suitable for investment, those subject to wide fluctuations, and which an investor must avoid if anything of importance depends upon his power to realise at any given moment. Even after the great collapse of trade in 1866 money was not so plentiful in the stock markets, and public securities of the safe sort were not carried to so high a price. Railway securities form so large a market on the Stock Exchange, the variations in their value are so constant, the amount of money invested in them so large, and the classes into which they may be divided so numerous, that some notice of them is necessary.
