STATE OF BUSINESS: Profits in Hand

Looking on war-boom profits as birds in the bush, U. S. investors have quietly let stock prices sag . They have done so despite the fact that their birds in hand have been good plump partridges. In October and November the list of dividends declared by U. S. corporations has been longer and fatter than for two years. The New York Times last week estimated that by the end of November 1939 common and preferred stock dividends would be at least $86,000,000 above the total of $2,944,774,934 for the same period last year.

Prize dividend of the week went to the 2,100-odd stockholders of tight, plushy Christiana Securities Co., organized to hold stock of E. I. du Pont de Nemours & Co. To Christiana’s well-fed stockholders went a last quarter dividend of $66.10, running their take per share for the year to $136.60, compared to $57.50 in 1938. Unlisted, diamond-studded Christiana was quoted $2,740 bid, offered at $2,840. For this super-blue chip, Christianans could thank their president, canny, beak-nosed Pierre du Pont. When Cousin Coleman decided to sell out his 20,000 shares of Du Pont in 1915, Pierre organized Christiana, poured in his and the holdings of other Du Fonts and friends on top of Coleman’s old bloc. Later he had to win a court decision to quiet the howls of dissident Du Fonts who thought the Du Pont company should have had a crack at Coleman’s holdings.

Among stocks that even small investors can buy, many a dividend was announced that was just as impressive. Cluett, Peabody & Co. declared a year-end distribution of $2, which brought its 1939 total to $2.75, compared to 85¢ for 1938. Wagner Electric, with $1, ran its 1939 total to $1.75, up $1.25 from 1938. Anaconda Copper announced a 50¢ dividend which ran its total for 1939 to $1.25, up 75¢ over 1938. American Radiator doubled its 1938 dividend with an announcement of 30¢. Midvale Co., munitions subsidiary of Baldwin Locomotive works, declared $3.50, putting its 1939 total at $6.50, against $5 last year.

Extras were declared by National Chemical, International Business Machines (stock), Beech-Nut Packing, American Cyanamid, smart, well-run Chesapeake & Ohio, Fairbanks, Morse. Dividends were resumed by Goodrich with $1 a share (the first since 1937), Hart, Schaffner & Marx with $1 (also the first since 1937). Among the aircrafts, fat with military and commercial orders, many of 1938’s dividend rates were doubled and tripled, although many a dollar of profit was plowed back into plant expansion or laid up in reserve against the rainy day when the war orders will end.

There is no way of finding out how many corporate stockholders there are in the U. S., but a fair guesstimate is 10,000,000 to 11,000,000 people. Bigger dividends of 1939 mean an average of upwards of $9 extra cash for this group. Including dividends declared during the last six weeks of the year, stockholders will have ten times as much extra spending money as the 7,000,000 savings depositors who next week draw $350,000,000 in Christmas funds.