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Credit networks and business dynamics in a viceregal capital: Santafé de Bogotá in the age of Charles III Financial History Review Pub Date : 2024-02-12 Oscar M. Granados, James V. Torres
This article provides aggregate data on credit flows in Santafé de Bogotá, the capital of the Viceroyalty of New Granada (present-day Colombia, Ecuador and western Venezuela). By perusing a thorough report submitted to Bourbon authorities on notarial transactions, which included both ecclesiastical and non-ecclesiastical loans in the city, the article estimates the volume and size of lending activity
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Public debt as private liquidity: the Poincaré experience (1926–1929) Financial History Review Pub Date : 2024-01-25 Aurélien Espic
In the follow-up to the 1926 political and monetary crisis in France, a new government led by Raymond Poincaré attempted to restore monetary stability by restructuring public debt. A sinking fund was missioned to withdraw short-term public bills from money markets. This policy disorganized the largest Parisian banks of the time, as they relied on these bills to manage their liquidity. Without developed
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Adam Smith's reversionary annuity: money's worth, default options and auto-enrollment Financial History Review Pub Date : 2023-10-06 Moshe A. Milevsky
When Adam Smith – author of Wealth of Nations (1776) and Theory of Moral Sentiments (1759) – was elected a professor at the University of Glasgow in 1751, he also joined an annuity ‘scheme’ that was unique for its time. The Scottish Ministers’ Widows’ Fund, as it was known, offered members of the Presbyterian Church as well as the university a choice of levels at which to contribute investment savings
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The meandering trajectories of financial innovations: commercial paper and its uses in sixteenth-century Lyon's trading networks Financial History Review Pub Date : 2023-10-06 Nadia Matringe
This article explores the complex dynamics of financial innovation in early modern times, challenging linear models of temporal and spatial divisions that tend to shape our understanding of the evolution of financial systems. It supports the idea that innovation should be viewed as a non-linear and contextual process, involving diverse stakeholders and characterised by interactions and unexpected occurrences
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Political violence and financial markets in Tsarist Russia Financial History Review Pub Date : 2023-10-06 Christopher A. Hartwell
There is little research studying the effects of political violence on financial markets over decades, especially in an atmosphere where the violence manifested itself in heterogeneous and geographically widespread ways. This article examines the authoritarian edifice of Tsarist Russia in the nineteenth century to examine the way in which capital markets perceived political instability in a country
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The consolidation of public banking in Spain: from the 1970s crisis to the 2008 crisis Financial History Review Pub Date : 2023-06-08 Yolanda Blasco-Martel, Joaquim Cuevas, Maria Carme Riera-Prunera
This article contributes to the literature analysing the role of public banks in crises. Taking the case of Spain, it analyses the behaviour of the public bank (ICO) between 1971 and 2015, specifically during two crises: the crisis of the 1970s, when Spain was an economically backward country coming out of a dictatorship; and that of 2008–13, by which time it had integrated into the international economy
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Financing industrial corporations in a developing economy: panel evidence from Imperial Russia Financial History Review Pub Date : 2023-03-15 Amanda Gregg, Steven Nafziger
This article explores the financing of early industrial corporations using newly constructed panel data from Imperial Russian balance sheets. We document how corporate capital structures and dividend payout policies reflected internal agency issues, information asymmetries with external investors, life cycle considerations, and other frictions present in the Russian context. In particular, we find
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Market access and transparency: the Genoa and Milan stock exchanges from Italian Unification to World War I Financial History Review Pub Date : 2023-01-31 Angelo Riva
This article focuses on the conflicts over market access rules on the two primary Italian stock exchanges, Milan and Genoa. These conflicts disrupted the quality of information produced by the two markets. Official brokers aimed to defend their monopoly on brokerage and capture rents by limiting market access. Banks wanted wider access so as to avoid paying these rents, create an opaque market and
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Prices: sources, problems, solutions Financial History Review Pub Date : 2023-01-26 Peter M. Solar
Price currents and newspapers are major sources of information on prices during the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries, but drawing conclusions about trends and fluctuations in values from the quotations in these sources poses several recurrent difficulties. After discussing the origins of the prices in these sources, we use a range of examples, mainly involving commodity prices, to illustrate important
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Stock exchange price currents, financial information and market transparency: an introduction Financial History Review Pub Date : 2023-01-26 Joost Jonker, Angelo Riva
Financial markets derive their political and societal legitimacy from their ability to produce fair and accurate prices. However, reviewing the literature on how stock exchanges price securities, we find an inherent tension between market organization and price disclosure, which is borne out by this special issue's historical case studies.
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De-coding the image of the firm: secret reserves and internal financing in the German chemical industry, c. 1890–1916 Financial History Review Pub Date : 2023-01-25 Frederic Steinfeld
This article uses the leading firms of the German chemical industry as a case study to provide a detailed example of how companies in the late nineteenth and early twentieth century used internal financing as an instrument of corporate finance. It traces the at first diverse significance of internal financing for the industry and identifies two moments of market concentration that triggered a convergence
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Monthly credit from and deposits in Swedish commercial banks, 1875-2020 Financial History Review Pub Date : 2023-01-13 Lars Ahnland
Since the global financial crisis in 2008, there has been an elevated interest in private debt and as a macroeconomic variable. In light of the lack of high-frequency data, this study presents a unique monthly time series dataset on credit from and deposits in Swedish commercial banks from 1875 to 2020, covering 1,752 monthly observations and most of Swedish commercial banking history. In a first application
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From free-for-all to self-governing monopoly: market organization and price information at the Amsterdam Stock Exchange, 1796–1940 Financial History Review Pub Date : 2022-12-19 Abe de Jong, Joost Jonker, Johan Poukens
For most of its history Amsterdam securities trading was entirely unregulated and spread over various venues frequented by different social groups, handicapping price transparency. A public price current emerged only in 1796 and then with wide bid-ask spreads to protect margins. To combat the confusion a curious pricing method, the mid-price system, emerged during the nineteenth century. Tied to a
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Pre-welfare state provision and adverse selection: enrolment in a Swedish nationwide health insurance society Financial History Review Pub Date : 2022-12-12 Lars Fredrik Andersson, Liselotte Eriksson, Josef Lilljegren
Mutual benefit societies evolved as the major provider for sickness, accident and life insurance in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries on both sides of the Atlantic. One of the major problems facing insurers was the risk of adverse selection, i.e. that unhealthy individuals had more incentives than healthy individuals to insure when priced for the average risk. By empirically examining
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Helsinki Stock Exchange: trading and listed securities, 1912–1981 Financial History Review Pub Date : 2022-12-09 Mika Vaihekoski
A newly collected historical database for the Helsinki Stock Exchange (HSE) is used to analyse the number and structure of listed equity securities. The analysis shows that from its establishment in October 1912 to the end of 1981, a total of 849 different stock series and related issue rights have been listed on the HSE. Of these, 206 are normal stock series and they represent 167 different companies
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Central banks’ interventions in exchange rate markets during the international gold standard: Italy 1880–1913 Financial History Review Pub Date : 2022-12-06 Paolo Di Martino
This article reconstructs the history of direct interventions in exchange rate markets performed by the leading Italian banks of issue: the Banca Nazionale until 1893, then the Banca d'Italia between 1894 and 1913. The article shows that this type of operation represented a constant and relevant commitment for both institutions; interventions were made in the bills and/or the bonds market, sometimes
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‘Propitious contrast’: Romanian borrowing in a Balkan mirror, 1878–1913 Financial History Review Pub Date : 2022-11-18 Andreea-Alexandra Maerean, Maja Pedersen, Paul Sharp
How was Romania able to borrow cheaply on the international capital markets before World War I? We explore this within the context of its three southeast European neighbours, Bulgaria, Greece and Serbia, using a novel dataset of monthly bond prices from the Berlin and London stock exchanges. A comparison of country characteristics and panel data analysis suggests that Romania was able to borrow under
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Stock exchange regulation and the official price lists of the stock exchanges of Brussels and Antwerp, 1801–1935 Financial History Review Pub Date : 2022-10-24 Johan Poukens, Frans Buelens
To fully understand and exploit the contents of stock exchange official price lists, an in-depth knowledge of local stock exchange regulations and practices is required. This article offers a comparative perspective on price discovery and quotation on the two most important Belgian stock exchanges, Brussels and Antwerp, from their establishment in 1801 up to the reform of 1935.
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Banking crises, banking mortality and the structuring of the banking market in Switzerland, 1850–2000 Financial History Review Pub Date : 2022-10-11 Thibaud Giddey, Malik Mazbouri
The Swiss financial centre, as it developed during the twentieth century, has for a long time been presented and perceived as a singularly stable and solid environment escaping crises and restructuring. This view, promoted by the dominant actors – private banks, cantonal banks and large commercial banks – presenting their own development, in a teleological vision, as success stories, is strongly challenged
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Health and safety regulations and stock returns: evidence from the 1974 Swedish legislative lottery Financial History Review Pub Date : 2022-09-06 Linus Siming
This article provides causal evidence on a long-standing controversy in the finance and labour literature, namely, whether better health and safety in the working environment is in the best interests of firm owners. While, on the one hand, an influential strand of the literature argues that improvements in workers’ health and safety provision can increase costs and harm the market value of equity,
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Securities trading in an emerging market: Indonesia, 1890s–1940s Financial History Review Pub Date : 2022-09-06 Pierre van der Eng
This article analyses trends in the development of the stock exchange in Jakarta between its stepwise institutionalisation since 1898 and its closure in 1942. The article contributes to literature on the significance of stock markets in the process of mobilising external capital for investment by private enterprise in emerging economies. It finds that the brokers participating in the stock exchange
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The limits of control: corporate ownership and control of German joint-stock firms, 1869–1945 Financial History Review Pub Date : 2022-07-06 Sibylle Lehmann-Hasemeyer, Andreas Neumayer
We study the social structure of ownership of German joint-stock firms covering the period 1869 to 1945 based on a random sample of attendance lists of general meetings. We confirm previous research findings based on smaller samples that despite several changes in the economic and political environment, the majority of shares of the attendees of the general meetings remained firmly in the hands of
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Going Dutch: monetary policy in the Netherlands during the interwar gold standard, 1925–1936 Financial History Review Pub Date : 2022-05-05 Philip T. Fliers, Christopher L. Colvin
Our study of the day-to-day management of monetary policy in the Netherlands between 1925 and 1936 reveals that policy leaders and central bankers were both willing and able to deviate from the monetary policy paths set by other countries, all while remaining firmly within the gold bloc. The Netherlands wielded an independent monetary policy while remaining on gold thanks to its central bank's plentiful
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The Bank of England's profits across 300 years: wars, financial crises and distribution Financial History Review Pub Date : 2022-04-06 Mike Anson, Forrest Capie
We have produced a series on the Bank of England's profits from its foundation in 1694 to the present time. This has not been available before. We explain the path of these profits over more than 300 years and account for their changing pattern. We next examine from where the profits derived, first in ‘normal times’, and then seeking, in particular, the impact of wars and financial crises. Other questions
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Financing Japan's Greater East Asia Co-Prosperity Sphere in Thailand Financial History Review Pub Date : 2022-03-08 Panarat Anamwathana, Gregg Huff
This article analyses Thailand's place in Japan's Greater East Asia Co-Prosperity Sphere and how Japan financed its goal of integrating the kingdom into the sphere. Financial arrangements to incorporate Thailand in a yen bloc go well beyond finance to reveal Japanese attitudes and policy towards the Co-Prosperity Sphere. In Thailand, Japan's use of ‘special yen’ created near open-ended Japanese purchasing
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The road to the 1980s write-downs of sovereign debt Financial History Review Pub Date : 2022-01-11 Edwin M. Truman
The Latin American debt crisis consumed the 1980s and was not restricted to Latin America. Starting from the August 1982 Mexican weekend, the crisis had three phases: Concerted Lending (1982-5), Baker Plan (1985-9) and Brady Plan (1989 to mid 1990s). This article describes the evolution of the debt strategy and the road to embracing debt write-downs at the end of the decade. In the absence of an external
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Pandemic recession and helicopter money: Venice, 1629–1631 Financial History Review Pub Date : 2022-01-11 Donato Masciandaro, Charles Goodhart, Stefano Ugolini
We analyse the money-financed fiscal stimulus implemented in Venice during the famine and plague of 1629–31, which was equivalent to a ‘net-worth helicopter money’ strategy – a monetary expansion generating losses to the issuer. We argue that the strategy aimed at reconciling the need to subsidize inhabitants suffering from containment policies with the desire to prevent an increase in long-term government
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Silver coins, wooden tallies and parchment rolls in Henry III's Exchequer Financial History Review Pub Date : 2021-12-13 Richard Cassidy
In the mid thirteenth century, England used only a single coin, the silver penny. The flow of coins into and out of the government's treasury was recorded in the rolls of the Exchequer of Receipt. These receipt and issue rolls have been largely ignored, compared to the pipe rolls, which were records of audit. Some more obscure records, the memoranda of issue, help to show how the daily operations of
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Gold rush: the political economy of the Yugoslavian gold exchange standard Financial History Review Pub Date : 2021-11-29 Aleksandar Radan Jevtic
This article analyses the economic, political and cultural factors that influenced the decision of policy-makers in Yugoslavia to join the gold exchange standard in the midst of the Great Depression in June 1931. The analysis proceeds in three stages. First, the economic reasons why policy elites and interest groups endeavoured to adopt the gold exchange standard are examined by looking at debates
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A complicated puzzle: spinsters, widows and credit in Sweden (1790–1910) Financial History Review Pub Date : 2021-11-10 Matteo Pompermaier
This article aims to retrace the extent of single women's engagement in the credit market. To this end, it relies on a series of more than 1,900 probate inventories drawn up between 1790 and 1910 in the two Swedish cities of Gävle and Uppsala. These two cities represent an ideal case study, because the process of industrialisation and economic development resulted in two differently structured credit
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Resource endowments and the problem of small change: insights from two American mints, 1600–1700 Financial History Review Pub Date : 2021-10-19 Jane E. Knodell, Catalina M. Vizcarra
This article discusses historical evidence from the Potosi mint and Massachusetts Bay mint that illustrates the importance of the resource endowment (in this case silver) for the provision of small change. We show that the availability of silver was fundamental in shaping incentives. The relative scarcity of silver in Massachusetts Bay contributed to the small scale of the mint's operations, and implied
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The 1783 proposal for a readymade note at the Bank of England Financial History Review Pub Date : 2021-08-25 David M. Batt
This article analyses the 1783 proposal to issue readymade notes to the Bank of England's private banking customers. Prior to 1783, I argue that there were two broad categories under which the Bank issued its notes into circulation: (1) notes which were issued to government in relation to the Bank's role as facilitator of the fiscal revenues of state, and (2) notes which were issued to its private
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Effects of credit restrictions in the Netherlands on credit growth and inflation Financial History Review Pub Date : 2021-07-22 Gabriele Galati, Jan Kakes, Richhild Moessner
Credit restrictions were used as a monetary policy instrument in the Netherlands from the 1960s to the early 1990s. Since these restrictions were aimed at containing money rather than credit growth, their focus was on net credit creation by the financial sector. We document the rationale of these credit restrictions and how their implementation evolved in line with the evolution of the financial system
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The French bonds: the little-known bidding war for France's holdings in American debt, 1786–1790 Financial History Review Pub Date : 2021-07-15 Peter Theodore Veru
In 1786, the Van Staphorst brothers, America's Dutch investment bank, entered the French office of the Director General of Finance, intent on making an offer for a portion of France's holdings of American bonds. Unknowingly, their offer set off a bidding war that could have ended with poorly capitalized American financial adventurers owing a large portion of bonds which could threaten the fragile health
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The historical dynamics of US financial exchanges Financial History Review Pub Date : 2021-07-14 Bjørn N. Jørgensen, Kenneth A. Kavajecz, Scott N. Swisher
The historical dynamics of entry and exit in the financial exchange industry are analyzed for a panel of 327 US exchanges from 1855 through 2012. We focus on economic, technological and regulatory factors. Using novel panel data evidence, we empirically test whether these factors are consistent with existing financial theories. We find that US exchanges are more likely to exit per year after the passage
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The role of pawnshops in risk coping in early twentieth-century Japan Financial History Review Pub Date : 2021-07-14 Tatsuki Inoue
This study examines the role of pawnshops as a risk-coping device in Japan in the early twentieth century, when the poor were very vulnerable to unexpected shocks such as illness. In contrast to European countries, Japanese pawnshops were the primary financial institution for low-income people up to the 1920s. Using data on pawnshop loans for more than 250 municipalities and exploiting the 1918–20
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Friends or foes? Brazil, the IMF and the World Bank, 1961–1967 Financial History Review Pub Date : 2021-06-21 Carlo Edoardo Altamura, Claudia Kedar
Between June 1959 and March 1964, the democratic governments of Brazilian presidents Juscelino Kubitschek (January 1956 – January 1961), Janio Quadros (January–August 1961), Ranieri Mazzilli (August–September 1961) and João ‘Jango’ Goulart (September 1961 – April 1964) received no support from the World Bank (WB), which refused to fund even a single new project during this period. During this same
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The foreign exchange market in Barcelona at the beginning of the fifteenth century Financial History Review Pub Date : 2021-05-19 Angela Orlandi, Giacomo Toscano
Based on the reconstruction of the monetary flows of a merchant-banking company operating in Barcelona at the beginning of the fifteenth century, this study aims to understand the reasons behind exchange-rate variations in the local currency with respect to the principal European markets, as well as the modalities and predictability of such oscillations. By using real rather than ‘hearsay’ rates, we
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Origins of arbitrage Financial History Review Pub Date : 2021-05-11 Geoffrey Poitras
Following a review of the etymology and modern usage of the term ‘arbitrage’, this article explores the relevance of historical context to possible instances of ancient arbitrage activity. Types of possible ‘arbitrage’ associated with the use of overvalued coinage in regions of Greek influence are considered. Comparison with Roman civilization reveals the relevance of social attitudes and legal institutions
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Keynes's trading on Wall Street: did he follow the same behaviour when investing for himself and for King's? Financial History Review Pub Date : 2021-03-03 Eleonora Sanfilippo
In the last few years Keynes's investment activity, both as an individual trader and as a manager of institutions’ portfolios, has attracted attention in the specialised literature. Recently his investments on Wall Street, in particular – both on his own account (Cristiano, Marcuzzo and Sanfilippo 2018) and on behalf of King's College, Cambridge (Chambers and Kabiri 2016) – have been analysed, and
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A reappraisal of Joseph Brennan and the achievements of Irish banking and currency policy 1922–1943 Financial History Review Pub Date : 2021-02-22 Eoin Drea, Frank Barry
Joseph Brennan, as secretary of the Irish Department of Finance (1923–7) and chair of the Irish Currency Commission (1927–43), was a pivotal influence on Irish banking and currency affairs. Yet, within the existing literature, his adherence to conservative British norms is seen as providing a ‘bleak prescription’ for the Irish economy. However, such a view ignores the fact that Brennan was far from
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A perfect symbiosis: Curaçao, the Netherlands and financial offshore services, 1951–2013 Financial History Review Pub Date : 2021-01-14 Tijn van Beurden, Joost Jonker
Analysing Curaçao as an offshore financial centre from its inception to its gradual decline, we find that it originated and evolved in close concert with the demand for such services from Western countries. Dutch banks and multinationals spearheaded the creation of institutions on the island facilitating tax avoidance. In this they were aided and abetted by their government, which firmly supported
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Woe to the vanquished? State, ‘foreign’ banking and financial development in Southern Italy in the nineteenth century Financial History Review Pub Date : 2020-12-07 Maria Stella Chiaruttini
After Southern Italy became part of a new, national state in 1860, its financial sector was radically transformed under Piedmontese influence. This article challenges the conventional wisdom that the aggressive penetration of a Northern credit institution, the future Bank of Italy, into the South following unification harmed the local banking system and highlights instead its transformative role in
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Explaining Latin America's persistent defaults: an analysis of the debtor–creditor relations in London, 1822–1914 Financial History Review Pub Date : 2020-11-23 Juan Flores Zendejas
This article analyses the reasons why most Latin American governments frequently defaulted on their debts during the nineteenth century. Contrary to previous works, which focused on domestic factors, I argue that supply-side factors were equally important. The regulatory framework at the London Stock Exchange prevented defaulting governments from having access to the capital market. Therefore, the
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From gentlemanly capitalism to lobbying capitalism: the City and the EEC, 1972–1992 Financial History Review Pub Date : 2020-11-10 Alexis Drach
The City of London has long attracted much academic and popular attention. However, little research has been done on the relationship between the City and the European Economic Community in the 1970s and 1980s, despite the accession of the United Kingdom in 1973. Based on archival material from central and commercial banks in the UK and France, this article explores the relationship between the City
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Regulatory foundations of financialisation: May Day, Big Bang and international banking, 1975–1990 Financial History Review Pub Date : 2020-11-10 Catherine R. Schenk
From the 1970s to the 1990s there was a revolution in international financial markets, which combined the processes of financialisation and globalisation. Deregulation and financial innovation were the two underlying forces that facilitated this transformation. At the same time, distinctive national characteristics of banking structures and cultures influenced the way that financial globalisation affected
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IRI: financial intermediary or entrepreneurial state? Financial History Review Pub Date : 2020-11-10 Franco Amatori
The Istituto per la Ricostruzione Industriale (IRI), a state-controlled holding company, was founded in 1933. Its original mission was to prevent the collapse of Italy's largest universal banks by taking over their huge industrial shareholdings. As a consequence, the historiography traditionally associates it with the concept of ‘entrepreneurial state’. This article aims to challenge this interpretation
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Networks and financial war: the brothers Warburg in the first age of globalization Financial History Review Pub Date : 2020-11-05 Harold James
This article examines the geo-economic consequences of the financial panic of October 1907. The vulnerability of the United States, but also of Germany, contrasted with the absence of a crisis in Great Britain. The experience showed the fast-growing industrial powers the desirability of mobilizing financial power, and the article examines the contributions of two influential brothers, Max and Paul
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Before the ‘locomotive’ runs: the impact of the 1973–1974 oil shock on Japan and the international financial system Financial History Review Pub Date : 2020-11-05 Kazuhiko Yago
This article offers a Japanese perspective on the debate about the international financial system immediately after the first oil shock of 1973–4. Using archival records from the OECD and Bank of Japan, I analyze the three key policy issues discussed at the meetings of Working Party 3 (WP3) of the OECD: petrodollar recycling, balance-of-payments adjustments, and the management of global growth. Documents
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From exceptional to normal: changes in the structure of US banking since 1920 Financial History Review Pub Date : 2020-11-03 Richard Sylla
A century ago the US commercial banking system was exceptional in two ways. It was by good measure the largest commercial banking system of any country. And it was different from the commercial banking systems of other leading countries in having tens of thousands of independent banks with very few branches rather than the more typical pattern of a far smaller number of banks with many branches. Today
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Seven transformative crises from European revolution to corona: globalization and state capacity Financial History Review Pub Date : 2020-09-22 Harold James
The article considers crises of globalization: the 1840s, the 1870s, the Great War, the Great Depression, the Great Inflation (1970s), the Global Financial Crisis (2008) and the Great Lockdown (2020). Each led to a reshaping of the institutions that supervised or regulated economic development globally but also nationally. In each case, a series of questions are answered: what were the origins of the
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Performance and development of a thin stock market: the Stockholm Stock Exchange 1912–2017 Financial History Review Pub Date : 2020-09-10 Kristian Rydqvist, Rong Guo
We estimate historical stock returns for Swedish listed companies in a newly constructed data set of daily stock prices that spans more than 100 years. Stock returns exhibit all the familiar characteristics. The growth of the public sector depressed the stock market, and the process of globalization revitalized it. Banks played an important role in the early development of the stock market. There was
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Keynes, inflation and the public debt: How to Pay for the War as a policy prescription for financial repression? Financial History Review Pub Date : 2020-08-18 Sebastian Teupe
Recent contributions on ‘financial repression’ and ‘money illusion’ have referred to Maynard Keynes's How to Pay for the War as a supporting document. This article discusses whether Keynes prescribed policies of ‘financial repression’ that were implemented in the United Kingdom, and other countries, following World War II. It seems reasonable that Keynes's writings were instrumental in translating
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The rise of financial accountability in British joint stock banks: 1825 to 1845 Financial History Review Pub Date : 2020-08-18 Chantal S. Game, Lisa M. Cullen, Alistair M. Brown
This study explores parliamentary reforms related to the financial accountability of banks following the 1825–6 and 1836–7 financial crises in England. An appraisal of nineteenth-century parliamentary Hansard transcripts reveals early banking legislative pursuits. The study observes the laissez-faire and interventionist approaches towards the banking enactments of 1826, 1833 and 1844 that underpin
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Was a sudden stop at the origin of German hyperinflation? Financial History Review Pub Date : 2020-07-09 Elena Seghezza, Pierluigi Morelli
Since the publication of Cagan's seminal contribution in 1956 and its further development by Sargent (1982) there has been a growing literature that seeks to explain German hyperinflation in terms of the monetary hypothesis. However, this article shows that the origins of this hyperinflation can be traced back to a sudden stop that occurred in the summer of 1922 at a time when expectations that the
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Supervisors against regulation? The Basel Committee and country risk before the International Debt Crisis (1976–1982) Financial History Review Pub Date : 2020-06-25 Alexis Drach
While the International Debt Crisis of the early 1980s was the most severe financial crisis since World War II and while national and international banking supervision was developing at that time, little is known about the response of supervisors to the deteriorating financial environment in the years preceding the crisis. Complementing the political and business history of the international debt situation
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Surge, retraction and prices: the performance of fiat coins in Sweden, c. 1715–1720 Financial History Review Pub Date : 2020-05-22 Peter Ericsson, Patrik Winton
From 1716 to 1718, Sweden experienced a shock of liquidity when the absolutist regime of Charles XII issued large amounts of fiat coins (mynttecken) in order to finance the Great Northern War. After the death of the king in November 1718, the new parliamentary regime decided to partially default on the coins. In international literature, this episode is largely unknown, and in Swedish historiography
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Tracking the growth of government securities investing in early modern England and Wales Financial History Review Pub Date : 2020-03-25 Carole Shammas
Interest in the growth of tradeable securities in early modern Britain, especially its relationship to economic development and the funding of government debt, has centered mainly on the borrower – whether it be trading company, industrial enterprise, or the state. This article directs attention to the investor, using Charity Commission Reports for England and Wales that document a dramatic mid-eighteenth-century
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Origins of too-big-to-fail policy in the United States Financial History Review Pub Date : 2020-03-17 George C. Nurisso, Edward Simpson Prescott
This article traces the origin of too-big-to-fail policy in modern US banking to the bailout of the $1.2b Bank of the Commonwealth in 1972. It describes this bailout and those of subsequent banks through that of Continental Illinois in 1984. During this period, market concentration due to interstate banking restrictions is a factor in most of the bailouts and systemic risk concerns were raised to justify
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The role of a creditor in the making of a debt crisis: the French government's financial support for Poland, between cold war interests and economic constraints, 1958-1981 Financial History Review Pub Date : 2020-03-04 Emmanuel Mourlon-Druol
In spite of considerable attention granted to sovereign debt failures, we still have limited knowledge of the incentives which induced creditors to lend at unsustainable levels. This article looks at the French government’s policy towards Poland from 1958, when economic cooperation between the two countries started, until Poland's announcement in 1981 that it could not service its debt. Export credit