U.S. security underwriters were in such clover as they had not whiffed since the Big Blow hit Wall Street 16½ long years ago. The Securities & Exchange Commission reported this week: corporate stock and bond issues in 1945 shot up to $5.8 billion, almost double the 1944 total.
Most underwriting, cashing in on low interest rates and a sellers' market, was in refinancing ($4.6 billion, a record). But new-money issues, nearly zero in wartime, when the Government paid the freight, started popping forth as soon as peace came to Europe, were blossoming thick & fast going into 1946. As the...