Tulipomania: The delirium of tulip bulbs
How a simple exotic flower caused the first major speculative bubble in recorded history and the bankruptcy of the Dutch economy in 1637.
The Cobra Effect: The perverse incentives of the economy
The curious story of how a reward from the British government to eliminate cobras in Delhi ended up multiplying the population of these reptiles.
The South Sea Company: Newton and the psychology of the masses
The resounding financial ruin of England in 1720 that trapped the greatest minds of the time, including the genius Isaac Newton.
The Panic of 1907: The day a single banker saved Wall Street
How financial magnate J. Pierpont Morgan served as a lender of last resort before the US Federal Reserve came into existence.
The Weimar Hyperinflation: Wheelbarrows of banknotes for a loaf of bread
Germany's absolute monetary collapse in 1923, where paper money was worth less than wood to light the stove.
Bretton Woods: The day the dollar dethroned gold
The secret 1944 conference in a New Hampshire hotel that laid the foundation for the modern world financial order.
The Mississippi Bubble: John Law's scheme that ruined France
The pioneering attempt by a Scottish fugitive to introduce paper money into France that ended in the absolute bankruptcy of the kingdom in 1720.
Black Tuesday: The stock market crash of 1929
The catastrophic burst of the speculative bubble of the 'roaring twenties' that dragged the world into the Great Depression.
The fall of LTCM: When the Nobel Prize winners almost broke the world
How the hedge fund Long-Term Capital Management collapsed in 1998 despite having the brightest mathematical minds on the planet.
The Dot-Com Bubble: The Illusion of the 'New Economy'
The golden era of the late 90s where any company with a '.com' suffix was worth billions without generating a cent of profit.
The Subprime Crisis of 2008: The Collapse of the Financial House of Cards
How junk mortgages packaged in complex mathematical derivatives toppled financial giants and unleashed the biggest crisis since 1929.
The Flash Crash of 2010: The day Wall Street crashed in 20 minutes
The dramatic event in which the New York Stock Exchange lost almost 1,000 points in minutes due to the behavior of high-frequency algorithms.
Fiat money in China: The invention of the Song Dynasty
The historical transition from barter and heavy metal coins to the first officially recorded use of paper money in the 11th century.
The Rai Stones of Yap: The ancestor of distributed accounting
How a small island in Micronesia used huge limestone disks as currency without physically moving them from their place.
The Waterloo Rescue: Nathan Rothschild and the Origin of His Fortune
The myth and reality of the brilliant use of carrier pigeons and spies to anticipate the outcome of the mythical battle against Napoleon in 1815.
The Origin of the Word 'Bankruptcy': The Italian 'Banco Rotto'
The curious and dramatic medieval tradition where the work tables of insolvent banks in Italy were literally broken.
The Latin American Debt Crisis of the 1980s: The Lost Decade
How the glut of cheap petrodollars of the 1970s economically choked an entire region when US interest rates rose.
George Soros against the Pound: The man who bankrupted the Bank of England
The mythical speculative exchange operation of 'Black Wednesday' in 1992 that forced the devaluation of the British currency.
The Enron Case: The fall of the creative accounting giant
The spectacular collapse of the seventh largest US company in 2001 due to systematic accounting fraud and debt concealment.
The Original Ponzi Scheme: Charles Ponzi's 1920s Trick
The story of the charismatic Italian immigrant who masterminded the world's most widespread pyramid scheme using international postage stamps.
The Japan Bubble: The day the Imperial Palace was worth more than California
The Japanese real estate and financial frenzy of the 1980s that led to the so-called 'Lost Decade' of its economy.
El Corralito Argentino: When the money was trapped in the bank
The drastic banking restriction imposed in Argentina in 2001 to stop a massive flight of deposits that led to a social outbreak.
The 100 trillion bill: Extreme hyperinflation in Zimbabwe
The monetary collapse of the 21st century in Africa, where the denomination of a single banknote reached fourteen zeros before disappearing.
The Window Tax: Architecture shaped by tax evasion
How a 1696 tax law in England and England led citizens to board up their own windows for tax reasons.
Adam Smith's Paradox of Value: Water versus Diamonds
Why water, essential for human survival, is extremely cheap, while useless diamonds are very expensive.
Gresham's Law: Why Bad Money Displaces Good
The economic principle formulated by Thomas Gresham in the 16th century that explains why people always prefer to spend the poorest quality currency.
The British Railway Bubble: The Boom of 1845
The investment craze of the 19th century in the United Kingdom that covered the British map of railways and ruined thousands of savers.
The Origin of the Bull and Bear Market: Bull and Bear Markets
The myths and historical explanations behind why the bull is associated with the rise and the bear with the fall of the stock market.
The Bernard Madoff fraud: The biggest pyramid scheme in history
How the former president of the Nasdaq stock exchange swindled $65 billion over decades from millionaires, banks and charitable foundations.
The Creation of the Federal Reserve: The Secret Jekyll Island Meeting
The clandestine conclave of 1910 in an exclusive club in Georgia where the great US bankers designed the central bank.
The Tobin Tax: The proposed tax to curb speculation
Nobel Prize winner James Tobin's 1972 proposal to tax short-term foreign currency transactions and stabilize markets.
The Dutch VOC: The most valuable company of all time
The story of the Dutch East India Company, the world's first corporation to be listed and issue shares.
The Banking Panic of 1933: The Day FDR Closed All the Banks
The historic 'bank holiday' declared by Roosevelt to stop the drain on deposits during the Great Depression.
The Plaza Accord of 1985: The planned depreciation of the dollar
How the G5 finance ministers signed the intervention of the currency markets in a luxurious New York hotel.
The origin of Wall Street: The wall that stopped the natives
The story behind the world's most famous financial street, which began as a wooden wall built by Dutch settlers.
The Marshall Plan: The financial reconstruction of Europe
The massive injection of US$13 billion after World War II to revive the European economy.
The Petrodollar: The strategic agreement that saved the dollar in 1973
How the US negotiated with the Saudi dynasty so that all the world's oil was priced exclusively in US dollars.
Black Monday of 1987: The largest percentage drop in a single day
The mysterious and sudden collapse of 22.6% of the Dow Jones that caught world markets by surprise without a clear cause.
The Origin of the Stock Exchange: The Amsterdam Stock Exchange of 1602
How the desire to share the risk of maritime commercial voyages gave rise to the modern stock market.
The Gold Confiscation of 1933: Executive Order 6102
President Roosevelt's historic decree that made private ownership of gold coins illegal in the United States.
The Iraq Bank Heist: The Biggest Cash Heist in History
How dictator Saddam Hussein personally withdrew $1 billion in cash from the central bank hours before the 2003 invasion.
The fall of Barings bank: Nick Leeson, the trader who bankrupted the queen
How a single 28-year-old trader ruined England's oldest investment bank in 1995 trading derivatives.
The Great Inflation of the Roman Empire: The devalued denarius
How the cutting of the fine silver content of imperial coins by emperors ruined the Roman economy in the 3rd century.
The German economic miracle: The monetary reform of 1948
How the introduction of the Deutsche Mark on a Sunday night destroyed the black market and revived the postwar economy.
The Cantillon Effect: The intrinsic inequality of printed money
Richard Cantillon's concept in the 18th century that explains why the issuance of new money benefits the rich at the expense of the poor.
Iceland's financial collapse: The country that became a bank
How the three main banks of a country of 300,000 inhabitants accumulated debts ten times greater than the national GDP in 2008.
The US Railroad Bubble: The Panic of 1873
How the bankruptcy of Wall Street's largest bank for financing railroads halted the American economy for six years.
The Origin of Fiat Money: The Nixon Shock of 1971
The historic Sunday night when the US unilaterally and definitively suspended the convertibility of the dollar into gold.
Iceland's sovereign debt crisis and the prosecution of banks
The unusual strategy of a Nordic country that chose to imprint the banks involved instead of socializing the losses.
The rule of 72: The mathematical calculation of compound interest
The most useful mental formula in personal finance to know how many years it will take you to double your invested capital.