Some of the most anticipated initial public offerings are for those companies already at the top of their industries but which have remained privately-held for a long time. Some large companies are held privately for more than a single generation. When they announce a public offering, it piques the interest of more investors than…
London’s ports, exchanges, merchants, and bankers may have been the most numerous and active across most areas of Britain’s commercial life, particularly in international trade and finance. But there was one city that specialized in an increasingly important niche in which London was far less dominant. Liverpool became the primary port for the import…
Merchants were among the first bankers in Europe. They served their fellow merchants, financing their trade. But among the first bankers were also goldsmiths. In England particularly, they came to store money on behalf of clients in their vaults, vaults they needed for their goldsmithing business anyway. In time, some goldsmiths shed their original…
There were various towns that became significant marketplaces in Europe in the 15th and 16th centuries, places like Bruges, Antwerp, and Amsterdam. Other places became significant banking centers; the Tuscan cities are most notable here but Augsburg in Bavaria was another. One of the most notable banking firms in Augsburg was that of the…
This is the second in a two-part series on cross-border actions by central banks in the 19th century. The first, covering the period 1800-1840, primarily addressed two episodes in which the Bank of England transacted with the Banque de France in order to replenish the former’s gold reserves. This allowed the Bank to avoid…
In the 20th century, various new financial organizations were launched, from the Bank for International Settlements to the International Monetary Fund, in order to grapple with global monetary challenges. To some extent, these were products of 20th century problems, from facilitating war reparations to strained efforts to keep the ailing international gold standard alive. While…
A conventional bond’s value is eroded by inflation, a fact which introduces a meaningful risk to long-term bonds. When inflation is expected to remain stable, investors often try to match the duration of their bond investments to the duration of their liabilities. So, long-term investors like pension funds or individuals saving for their own…
Prior to the commercial revolution of the very late Middle Ages and Renaissance, it was conventional wisdom that money was ‘sterile’ and produced nothing of value by itself. So, most of Europe was skeptical of interest-bearing loans. In those days, the charge of usury could be levelled against anyone charging any interest. However, in the…
Developments in finance have often been more readily associated with commercial and industrial activities than pastoral or rural ones. True, the former drives considerable demand for financial services but so too do the latter. Yet, while urban finance advanced considerably in the 18th century, rural economies were not as transformed by the advent of…
For centuries, the wealthiest families in Britain were the country’s largest landowners. As commercial activity grew from the 17th century onwards though, this tendency began to diminish, but only slightly. Later, the Industrial Revolution created many new fortunes outside the landowning aristocracy. Nonetheless, there was always some portion of new urban wealth that was…
