The 1929 Stock Market Crash
In early 1928 the Dow Jones Average went from a low of 191 early in the year, to a high of 300 in December of 1928 and peaked at 381 in September of 1929. (1929…) It was anticipated that the increases in earnings and dividends would continue. (1929…) The price to earnings ratings rose from 10 to 12 to 20 and higher for the market’s favorite stocks. (1929…) Observers believed that stock market prices in the first 6 months of 1929 were high, while others saw them to be cheap. (1929…) On October 3rd, the Dow Jones Average began to drop, declining through the week of October 14th. (1929…) On the night of Monday, October 21st, 1929, margin calls were heavy and Dutch and German calls came in from overseas to sell overnight for the Tuesday morning opening. (1929…) On Tuesday morning, out-of-town banks and corporations sent in $150 million of call loans, and Wall Street was in a panic before the New York Stock Exchange opened. (1929…) On Thursday, October 24th, 1929, people began to sell their stocks as fast as they could. Sell orders flooded the market exchanges. (1929…) This day became known as Black Thursday. (Black Thursday…) On a norm
Margin buying is another reason why people believed that the crash happened. Though it is not the main reason, there was very little margin relative to the value of the market. The new President of the Federal Reserve Board, Adolph Miller, tightened the monetary policy and set out to lower the stock prices since he perceived that speculation led stocks to be overpriced, causing damage to the economy. Also, in the beginning of 1929, the interest rate charged on broker loans rose tremendously. This policy reduced the amount of broker loans that originated from banks and lowered the liquidity of non-financial and other corporations that financed brokers and dealers. Lastly, many public officials commented that the stock price was too high. Herbert Hoover publicly stated that stocks were overvalued and that speculation hurt the economy. Hoover’s statement suggested to the public the lengths he was willing to go to control the stock market. These kinds of statements encouraged investors to believe that the market would continue to be strong, which could be one of the causes of the crash. (1929…) By mid November, the value of the New York Stock Exchange listings had dropped over 40%, a loss of $26 billion. (1929-1931) At one point in the crash tickers were 68 minutes behind. (1929-1931) An average of about $50,000,000 a minute was wiped out on the exchange. (1929-1931) A few investors that lost all of their money jumped to their deaths from office buildings. Others gathered in the streets outside the Stock Exchange to learn how much they had lost. (Black Thursday…) There are five proposed reasons as to why the stock market crashed. One of the reasons was that stocks were overpriced and the crash brought the share prices back to a normal level. However, some studies using standard measures of stock value, such as Price to Earning ratios and Price to Dividend ratios, argue that the share prices were not too high. Another reason is that there were massive frauds and illegal activity in the 1920’s stock mar
Some common words found in the essay are:
Stock Market, Jones Average, Federal Reserve, Stock Exchange, Adolph Miller, Price Dividend, Crash Depression, Herbert Hoover, Thursday… Cause, President Hoover, stock market, jones average, stock exchange, 1929… october, dow jones average, dow jones, invested stock market, federal reserve, invested stock, crash 1929…, 1929 stock market, brokers dealers, stock market crash, york stock exchange, york stock,
Approximate Word count = 1376
Approximate Pages = 6 (250 words per page double spaced)
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