1. Historical Context
In the jargon of Wall Street and global financial markets, market trends are universally described as 'Bull Market' (bullish) and 'Bear Market' (bearish).
2. The Breakdown Event
There are two accepted historical explanations for this curious animal metaphor. The first is based on the way in which each animal attacks its opponent: the bull charges by throwing its horns upwards (bullish movement), while the bear strikes downwards with its heavy claws (bearish movement). The second explanation, of linguistic and commercial origin in 18th century London, comes from an old English saying: 'do not sell the bear's skin before you have hunted the bear'. Fur traders of the time often sold pelts before receiving them from trappers in the hope that prices would fall in the meantime (short selling); These speculative traders became known on the London Stock Exchange as 'bears' (bearskin jobbers), and their counterparts who bet on rising prices were called 'bulls'.
3. Global Economic Impact
This vocabulary was definitively consolidated with the popularization of political cartoons in the 19th century and the journalistic chronicles of Wall Street, becoming universal symbols of investor psychology.
Key Financial Lesson (Psychology of Money)
The language of finance uses archetypal symbols to reflect collective psychological dynamics of greed (bull) and fear (bear) that govern irrational market behavior in the short term.
4. Practical Case or Real Life Example
The famous bronze statue of the 'Charging Bull', installed clandestinely by the artist Arturo Di Modica in 1989 after Black Monday of 1987, is today the global physical icon of strength and financial optimism.