SURVIVING A FINANCIAL CRISIS

Jame DiBiasio explores how financiers can learn from the mistakes of the past

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What is one of the earliest examples of a financial crisis?

We’ve had financial crises since we’ve had markets. One of the best-known examples is the tulip bulb mania of 17th-century Amsterdam, a wild speculative investment bubble in tulips, which at the peak sold for ten times the annual income of skilled artisans. It was the Dutch who created banking institutions as we recognise them today and the first ‘modern’ capitalist society. They invented the stock exchange and the model for a central bank. Following the Wars of Religion, the Dutch were also the first to introduce a very pragmatic version of tolerance – Protestant, Catholic or Jewish, you could do business together. People began to get much more excited about money and what they could do with it.

One of the most infamous financial crises is the 1929 stock market crash. What is the background to this?