We examine the historical record of the financial crises that have often accompanied surges of globalization in the past. The issue of contagion, the spread of financial turbulence from the crisis center to its trading partners, is confronted with historical and statistical evidence on the...

Over the course of the nineteenth century the London Stock Exchange evolved from a market dealing primarily in new issues of British government debt to become the preeminent exchange of the first global capital market. By 1914, one-third of the public capital available to investors anywhere in...

Financial innovations and crises: the view backwards from Northern Rock / Jeremy Atack -- An economic explanation of the early Bank of Amsterdam, debasement, bills of exchange and the emergence of the first central bank / Stephen Quinn and William Roberds -- With a view to hold: the emergence of...