The British Railway Mania

How a disruptive technology created the biggest speculative bubble in the history of England

/THREAD/

1/ Railways were the most disruptive technology of the 19th century, known as the "railway age", transforming England from an agricultural to an industrialized nation.
2/ The development of railway infrastructure and locomotives started at the end of the 18th century but experienced immense growth after 1830.
3/ Hundreds of railway related bills were passed every year with proposed rails totaling 10,000 miles, a third of which was never built due to poor financial planning, competition, or fraud.
4/ In the mid-1840s, the Bank of England cut interest rates rendering government bonds unattractive, and investors more willing to rush in the railway investments.
5/ In 1825 the Bubble Act, passed after the South Sea Bubble in 1720, was repealed enabling easier formations of companies and ventures.

*For more on the South Sea Bubble see below
๐Ÿ‘‡๐Ÿ‘‡๐Ÿ‘‡
https://t.co/ggB2vFv9Ha
6/ The lack of regulation, and the media promotion attracted many investors who could purchase shares of railway companies with just a 10% deposit, with many middle-class families investing their entire savings.
7/ The railway network expanded from less than 100 miles in 1830 to 6,000 miles in the late 1840s connecting all the major cities in the country.
8/ The disruptive potential of the railway technology made investors to rush in for investing, with the invested capital exceeding 1/3 of the country's GDP by 1850.
9/ Many entrepreneurs got into financing, constructing, and operating the railway lines gaining immense wealth.

Most notable among them was George Hudson who operated 1/3 of the railway lines.
10/ Shares became extremely volatile due to the mania, peaking in 1845 with the dividend rates exceeding 8%.

In 1845, investors started realizing the financial viability of many projects was not guaranteed and the investments were not as lucrative as they had initially thought.
11/ Along with the rise of interest rates by the Bank of England and the Irish Potato Famine, money started flowing from railway investments back to government bonds.
12/ The sudden lack of interest and outflux of capital led to the bubble bursting in 1845 and the market crashing.

The shares of the railway companies dropped below half of their peak price, with dividend rates slashed to 2%.
13/ Many companies were on the brink of bankruptcy, being eventually bought out by their big competitors at a fraction of their value.
14/ After the bubble burst and mania fizzled, the improper business practices of George Hudson were revealed.

Hudson, also a member of the British parliament, had engaged in bribery, embezzlement, and insider trading.
15/ Hudson's operations were basically a Ponzi scheme using the invested capital by new investors to pay the dividend to the old investors.
16/ The industry rebounded after 1850 but never reached the levels of the 1845 mania, due to the maturity of the industry and the government regulation.

/END/
If you liked this thread click below and retweet the first tweet

https://t.co/oBjT1zycin
For more educational threads on financial independence and investing for beginners see below for a collection of threads and follow me to stay updated ๐Ÿ‘‡๐Ÿ‘‡๐Ÿ‘‡

https://t.co/6o3A2IQCMs

More from Kostas ๐Ÿ‘จโ€๐Ÿ’ผ ๐Ÿ“ˆ ๐Ÿ’ธ

If you want to become financially independent and don't know where to start, here is a thread that will help you get started

/THREAD/

1. Review your expenses and make a budget

It will help you see where you overspend, make a plan to save, pay down debt and start


2. Set your investing and retirement goals

How much do you need to support yourself in retirement and when do you want to


3. The earlier you start investing, the better.

Here's why and how time and compounding can become your


4. Invest in an index fund

It's easy, safe, cheap, and the best choice for a beginner in investing, with not much time for
The Mother of All Squeezes

How Volkswagen went from being on the brink of bankruptcy to the most valuable company in the world in two days

/THREAD/


1/ At the peak of the 2008 financial crisis, Volkswagen was considered a very likely candidate for bankruptcy.

Heavily indebted and already financially struggling before 2008, with car sales expected to plummet due to the ongoing global crisis.


2/ With GM and Chrysler filing for bankruptcy in 2009, shorting the VW stock would seem a safe bet.

If you are not familiar with stock shorts and short squeezes check my thread


3/ On October 26, 2008, Porsche announced it had increased its stake at VW from 30% to 74%.

This was a surprise to many who were led to believe that Porsche wasn't planning a takeover of VW, based on the company's announcements.


4/ Before the announcement, the short interest was approximately 13% of the outstanding shares, a number considered relatively low.

Porsche had a 30% stake, the Lower Saxony government fund held 20% of the shares, and another 5% was held by index funds.

More from Finance

Last week Hizbollah's finance institution Al Qard el Hasan was hacked by Spiderz. A group of people took that Data and tried to make sense out of it. Below are the findings

https://t.co/eGLqvb28o5


Loans are provided to borrowers for gold deposits or other guarantees, to the association's members and to unsecured applicants.

AQAH had a carried forward loan balance of $450 million as of December 31, 2019. This balance has been increasing at a yearly rate of 13.4%.


AQAH laundered around $475 million in 2019 in the form of disbursed loans paid to more than 20,000 borrower accounts; mostly to borrowers with gold deposits.

Deposits accounts have been offered to 307,000 members of the association, 83,000 contributors as well as to 600 companies. AQAH closed 2019 with an overall depositors accounts balance of around $500 million.

You May Also Like