106 THE WORK OF THE STOCK EXCHANGE 
necessitate this drastic action, were clearly stated™ by a former 
President of the Stock Exchange: 
Our experience of many years as Governors of the Exchange, and 
the experience of previous Governing Committees, is that a small 
amount of stock in the list leads to a condition that is dangerous to 
ourselves and to our customers, the public; and therefore, in order to 
sbviate the danger, when in our opinion that condition has been 
reached, we remove the stock from the list or suspend it from deal- 
ings. . . . The danger may arise from two causes. A small quantity 
of stock is more easily subject to manipulation than a large quantity, 
and by means of manipulation people may be induced to buy stock at 
very much greater prices than it is worth. The other danger, which 
of course is the greatest one we fear, is the subject of a corner in the 
stock, which not only hurts the broker and his customer, but de- 
moralizes the whole country, the Northern Pacific corner being a case 
in point. 
The Stock Exchange, therefore, is usually unwilling to list 
a very small security issue in the beginning. Moreover, it 
watches with particular attention, listed issues whose outstand- 
ing amounts have for any reason been considerably decreased. 
This sometimes happens when an issue of serial bonds has 
almost all been retired, or when in a reorganization some old 
stock issue has almost all been converted into a new security 
issue. The power to suspend dealings in any listed security, or 
to strike it from the list entirely, is and must from the nature 
of things be instantly exercised. 
The Problem of “Corners.”—It is particularly necessary 
when the free and open market for a security has been de- 
stroyed by the establishment of a “corner” in it that, for the 
protection of the public, trading in it should quickly be halted 
on the Exchange. Corners are more difficult of exact defi- 
nition than might at first appear. A partial corner in a security 
may occur when a single individual or group of individuals 
gain possession of either a large majority or all of its floating 
supply. A complete corner arises from such an ownership of 
TT 18 See testimony of H. K. Pomroy in ‘Money Trust Investigation,” Vol. I, p. 494.