I flu*
H ma
^1 im;
^ ma
fluctuations in the capital market — the varying market capitalization of securities — turn about imagined future events. The forecast in the case may be more or less sagacious, but, however sagacious, it retains the character of a forecast based on other grounds besides the computation of past results.
All capital which is put on the market is in this way subjected to an interminable process of valuation and revaluation — i.e. a capitalization and recapitalization — on the basis of its presumptive eaming-capacity, whereby it all assumes more or less of a character of intangibility. But the most j elusive and intangible items of this marketable capital are, of course, those items which consist of i capitalized good-will, since these are intangible 'goods from start to finish. It is upon this factor of good-will in capital that a change in presumptive eaming-capacity falls most immediately, and this factor shows the widest and freest market fluctuar tions. The variations in the capitalized value of merchantable good-will are relatively wide and imstable, as is shown by the quotations of common stock.