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The article presents several charts and statistics concerning the manuscripts submitted to the journal for 1972 and compared with previous years.

In a recent article, economists Merton H. Miller and Franco Modigliani (MM) applied a variation of their well-known model in the statistical estimation of the cost of capital to the electric utility industry. While estimates obtained for the cost of capital by MM have some intuitive appeal it is concluded that these results are to be attributed more to circumstances prevailing at the time of the MM study than to the theoretical consistency of the model employed. Results of an extension of the analysis used by MM to years 1955 and 1958-64 inclusive have been reported in this article. The effect of leverage on the value of the firm is still a much debated issue. MM imply, quite correctly, that growth has value only if the company is expected to earn a rate of return in excess of its cost of capital on its expected future net investments. The misspecification of the growth variable combined with effects on value of the unknown factors embodied in the regression constant emerge as main causes of the inadequacy of the MM model.