News stories from Thursday January 23, 1975

Summaries of the stories the major media outlets considered to be of particular importance on this date:

President Ford signed a proclamation increasing the import fee on petroleum. Meanwhile, Democratic members of Congress declared that his action constituted "an abuse of presidential power, like Watergate," and major moves were made in the House and Senate even before Mr. Ford signed the proclamation to prevent the increased fees from ever taking effect. [New York Times] The Federal Energy Administration said that President Ford's energy and tax-cut proposals, if enacted by Congress, probably would add to the spendable income of some households and certainly would shrink it for others, and released figures in support of its statement. [New York Times] The general board of the A.F.L.-C.I.O., in an emergency meeting to discuss President Ford's energy economic proposals, demanded a boycott of oil from the Arab nations that took part in the 1973-74-embargo and called for rationing at home. It also rejected Mr. Ford's economic program, which the organization's president, George Meany, described as "the weirdest one I have ever seen." He also rejected proposals by Democrats in Congress as "press statements" with no substance. [New York Times] The Chrysler Corporation reported that its rebate program had lifted sales of its compact cars, although overall sales were still behind levels of a year ago. The first nationwide sales figures compiled since the program went into effect Jan. 13 show that Chrysler's compact sales were up 12 percent from a year ago. Just prior to the rebates, sales of those models had been running at half of the 1974 levels. [New York Times] New statistics indicate that a man in his 40's or 50's is less likely to die of a heart attack than men of the same age a decade ago, possibly because of public-health campaigns. The drop in the coronary death rate, first noted last year in data from the 1960s, continued through 1972, indicating that "the downtrend is real, not a statistical fluke," according to Dr. Jeremiah Stamler, a leading heart specialist. [New York Times] Whether Britain should withdraw from the Common Market will be decided by a nationwide vote by the end of June, Prime Minister Wilson announced today in a long-awaited statement in the House of Commons. Mr. Wilson said his government would make a recommendation to the people on how to vote. The referendum will mark a historic departure from British traditions. Mr. Wilson once opposed a referendum as a breach of constitutional custom. The referendum proposal, however, fulfills a major plank in the Labor party's platform. [New York Times] Secretary of State Kissinger reportedly told the Senate Foreign Relations Committee that when the latest round of Israeli-Egyptian negotiations have been concluded, the Soviet Union will probably have to be included in the next phase of Middle East peace efforts. [New York Times] Defense Secretary James Schlesinger made several major statements regarding the Middle East to reporters after his address to the Economic Club of New York Wednesday. He said that he was confident the United States "can provide the resources" to sustain Israeli forces if there is another Middle East war and that he did not think a new conflict would last more than three weeks. He reaffirmed the "military feasibility" of military intervention in Middle East oil areas to prevent national strangulation. He said flatly that such action was "within the power" of the United States and this was "a statement of fact." [New York Times]

Stock Market Report

Dow Jones Industrial Average: 656.76 (+4.15, +0.64%)
S&P Composite: 72.07 (+0.33, +0.46%)
Arms Index: 1.12

	Issues	Volume*
Advances	914	9.90
Declines	470	5.68
Unchanged	419	2.38
Total Volume		17.96

* in millions of shares

Arms Index is the ratio of volume per declining issue to volume per advancing issue; a figure below 1.0 is bullish.

Market Index Trends
Date	DJIA	S&P	Volume*
January 22, 1975	652.61	71.74	15.33
January 21, 1975	641.90	70.70	14.78
January 20, 1975	647.45	71.08	13.45
January 17, 1975	644.63	70.96	14.25
January 16, 1975	655.74	72.05	17.11
January 15, 1975	653.39	72.14	16.58
January 14, 1975	648.70	71.68	16.61
January 13, 1975	654.18	72.31	19.78
January 10, 1975	658.79	72.61	25.89
January 9, 1975	645.26	71.17	16.34