Podcasts about South Sea Company

This week we travel back to England at the turn of the 18th century when economic theory was in its infancy, which meant so too was the art of market manipulation. The South Sea Company and its evil mastermind John Blunt were meant to lend money to the government while making millions in trade to the Spanish New World. What happened though was a string of shams that would change the English government forever.

So we have planned mating programs in the livestock business, this would indicate that the elite do the same thing within their own family.

Memoirs of Extraordinary Popular Delusions by Charles Mackay We pick up this week learning about how private enterprise came up with the plan to save the English economy by exploiting the new frontiers of South America through forming the South Sea Company in 1711. Driven by the promise of ships full of gold coming from the native tribes of the New World a frenzy of speculation in stocks in the company drove stock values through the roof. However, the riches failed to materialise as Spain, in control of most of the New World would not allow free trade from their English rivals. But this didn't prevent some people becoming wealthy from the scam while ruining many, many others. Story (03:01)   Find Memoirs of Extraordinary Popular Delusions by Charles Mackay https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/24518            Supporting Sleepy Time Tales If you would like to support my work and help keep the podcast available and for free, there are several ways you can support the show. ·        You can support the show as a supporter on Patreon and receive a host of bonuses including Patron only episodes and special edits https://www.patreon.com/sleepytimetales ·        If you're enjoying Sleepy Time Tales and would like to make a financial contribution, but would rather not commit to a monthly payment then you can throw a tip in the jar at paypal.me/sleepytimetales ·        Get yourself a set of SleepPhones, headphones designed specially for your needs as an insomniac who likes to listen to something to help you sleep, take a look at https://sleepytimetales.net/sleepphones ·        Or check out our new Merch store up at TeePublic where you can buy Sleepy Time Tales merch or even cool works from other creators. Go to https://www.teepublic.com/?ref_id=25247   Patreon Sleep Tight Patrons Chris & Moya Chuck Mysti Roberta Charity Traci Emily Moya Brian Sandra Jillian Anita Demelza Carla     Please Share If you're enjoying the show, and finding it helps you sleep despite the stresses and strains of your life, the absolute best thing you can do is share it with your friends, families, acquaintances, cellmates etc. Anyone who needs a good night's sleep might benefit. So please share it with the people in your life, whether in person or on social media.     Find The Show Website: sleepytimetales.net Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/sleepytimetales Twitter: https://twitter.com/sleepytimetales Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/sleepytimetalespodcast/ YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/c/SleepyTimeTales Merch: https://www.teepublic.com/?ref_id=25247 Project Gutenberg Terms of Use https://www.gutenberg.org/wiki/Gutenberg:Terms_of_Use  

It’s the bubble episode where fortunes are made and lost. Sir Isaac Newton will learn that what goes up must come down and lose his hard earned cash in this thing. People will suicide but the main thing is the government must look like it’s doing something.

We're in the aftermath of an extraordinary bubble in cryptocurrencies and the collapse of FTX is a defining chapter of the industry's turmoil. But what does history tells us about the cycle of bubbles and busts? Which past manias are the most similar to what we've just seen? In this episode, we speak with Brad DeLong, an economic historian at the University of California at Berkeley, who is also the author of the new book, "Slouching Towards Utopia: An Economic History of the Twentieth Century." He explains how the FTX saga shares shocking similarities with the story of the South Sea Company, a British endeavor that was at the center of a massive mania of speculation in the early 1700s.See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Dr. Helen Paul bursts the South Sea Bubble, tracing the triangular trade of slavery between London and Britain's colonies in South Asia, Africa, and the Caribbean, via John Cleveley's 18th century painting, The Luxborough Galley on Fire. Sailing into the dark green waters of the mid-Atlantic Ocean, the Luxborough Galley is in imperilled. Consumed by flames, with no land in sight, its white passengers frantically firefight - to no avail. Commissioned by one of the ship's few survivors for display in Greenwich, John Cleveley's six oil paintings recast the story as one of British heroism - erasing the history of the South Sea Company's colonial profiteering, catastrophic South Sea Bubble of 1720, and scapegoating its enslaved Black passengers for carelessly causing the blaze. Still housed in the National Maritime Museum, on the southern bank of the River Thames, John Cleveley's rendering exposes London's vast investment into the international slave trade, linking British colonies across the world. By focussing on cannibalism, it unintentionally commemorates the inhumanity, lack of civislisation, and crimes against humanity committed by its white colonial benefactors. PRESENTER: Dr Helen Paul, lecturer in Economics and Economic History at the University of Southampton, and Honorary Associate Professor at the Bartlett School of Sustainable Construction at UCL. ART: The Luxborough Galley on Fire, 25 June 1727, John Cleveley the Elder (c. 18th Century). IMAGE: 'The 'Luxborough Galley' on fire, 25 June 1727'. SOUNDS: One Man Book. PRODUCER: Jelena Sofronijevic. Follow EMPIRE LINES at: twitter.com/jelsofron/status/1306563558063271936 Support EMPIRE LINES on Patreon: patreon.com/empirelines

The South Sea Company was a state funded slave trading company into which the main politicians of the day invested including the first Prime Minister of the UK. Robert Walpole was a slaver. He negotiated a means to continue his power within parliament and the government to make sure he could keep his lifestyle going. He needed politics to stay financially viable. Robert Walpole was a slaver!The South Sea Company financial bubble eventually burst and when it did a lot of the country's elite, not to mention a number of European investors too, all suffered huge financial losses. Upon its dissolution, its assets were divided between two entities: The Bank of England and the East India Company.These are but some of the legacies of the period that remain under-represented in modern political debate. We talk about the greats of the past, especially considering the absolute dearth of good politicians today. Yet do we really know what these supposed past greats got up to? Here we take a typical Aydan inspired look at the life of one of the most important politicians in British history.As always, thank you Aydan for your time and the raw entertainment of your analytical style.Enjoy!I welcome opinions of every kind so please come and find me on social media at:Instagram: TwoandaMicTwitter: TwoandaMic1

In the early 18th century, Britain needed money. In 1711, the South Sea Company was established to try to manage this debt, and the heart of the debt consolidation the company arranged was a debt-for-equity swap that did NOT keep the nation from incurring more debt.  Learn more about your ad-choices at https://www.iheartpodcastnetwork.com

Tornando a quando abbiamo parlato nell'episodio relativo alle bolle speculative, la seconda bolla dopo quella dei tulipani nella metà del 1600 è stata quella di inizio ‘700 relativa alla South Sea Company. “La finanza è l'arte di far passare i soldi di mano in mano, finché non spariscono.” Robert W. Sarnoff Sigla di Eric Buffat Per chi vuole acquistare il libro, il cui ricavato andrà totalmente a favore dell'associazione Dravet Italia: https://www.amazon.it/finanza-amichevole-Semplificare-concetto-renderlo/dp/B08DSSZHS9/ Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Directors' duties. While corporate constitutions typically set out the balance of power between directors, shareholders, employees and other stakeholders, additional duties are owed by members of the board to the corporation as a whole. First, rules can restrain or empower the directors in whose favor they exercise their discretion. While older corporate law judgments suggested directors had to promote "shareholder value", most modern state laws empower directors to exercise their own "business judgment" in the way they balance the claims of shareholders, employees, and other stakeholders. Second, all state laws follow the historical pattern of fiduciary duties to require that directors avoid conflicts of interest between their own pursuit of profit, and the interests of the corporation. The exact standard, however, may be more or less strict. Third, many states require some kind of basic duty of care in performance of a director's tasks, just as minimum standards of care apply in any contract for services. However, Delaware has increasingly abandoned substantive objective duties, as it reinterpreted the content of the duty of care, allowing liability waivers. Stakeholder interests. Most corporate laws empower directors, as part of their management functions, to determine which strategies will promote a corporation's success in the interests of all stakeholders. Directors will periodically decide whether and how much of a corporation's revenue should be shared among directors' own pay, the pay for employees (for example, whether to increase or not next financial year), the dividends or other returns to shareholders, whether to lower or raise prices for consumers, whether to retain and reinvest earnings in the business, or whether to make charitable and other donations. Most states have enacted "constituency statutes", which state expressly that directors are empowered to balance the interests of all stakeholders in the way that their conscience, or good faith decisions would dictate. This discretion typically applies when making a decision about the distribution of corporate resources among different groups, or in whether to defend against a takeover bid. For example, in Shlensky v Wrigley the president of the Chicago Cubs baseball team was sued by stockholders for allegedly failing to pursue the objective of shareholder profit maximization. The president had decided the corporation would not install flood lights over the baseball ground that would have allowed games to take place at night, because he wished to ensure baseball games were accessible for families before children's bedtime. The Illinois court held that this decision was sound because even though it could have made more money, the director was entitled to regard the interests of the community as more important. Following a similar logic in AP Smith Manufacturing Co v Barlow a New Jersey court held that the directors were entitled to make a charitable donation to Princeton University on the basis because there was "no suggestion that it was made indiscriminately or to a pet charity of the corporate directors in furtherance of personal rather than corporate ends." So long as the directors could not be said to have conflicting interests, their actions would be sustained. Conflicts of interest. Since the earliest corporations were formed, courts have imposed minimum standards to prevent directors using their office to pursue their own interests over the interests of the corporation. Directors can have no conflict of interest. In trusts law, this core fiduciary duty was formulated after the collapse of the South Sea Company in 1719 in the United Kingdom. Keech v Sandford held that people in fiduciary positions had to avoid any possibility of a conflict of interest, and this rule "should be strictly pursued". --- Send in a voice message: https://anchor.fm/law-school/message Support this podcast: https://anchor.fm/law-school/support

Nel 1711 venne costituita una società, la South Sea Company, che in cambio di privilegi per l’esplorazione e lo sfruttamento del commercio dei Mari del Sud promise di assumersi l’onere del debito pubblico inglese. La società emise un gran numero di azioni di cui faceva aumentare il valore fittizio finanziandone essa stessa l’acquisto, senza svolgere effettiva attività commerciale. Nel 1720 i dirigenti della South Sea Company scomparvero portando con sé le liquidità restanti e la società fallì causando un gran caos finanziario e lasciando in miseria un gran numero di speculatori (tra i quali vi erano molti membri della Corte e del Parlamento).In questo nuovo Video Podcast proviamo ad analizzare quanto successo e quali lezioni possiamo trarne.

Find out more on our website: https://bit.ly/3zf589F Longlisted for The Financial Times and McKinsey business book of the year award, Money for Nothing dives into the most famous financial scandal in the history of modern capitalism, the South Sea Bubble. The South Sea Company had been formed to trade with Spanish America. But it had almost no ships and did precious little trade. Instead it got into financial gambles on a massive scale, taking over the government's debt and promising to pay the state out of the money received from the shares it sold. And how they sold. In the summer of 1720 the share price rocketed and everyone was making money. Until the carousel stopped, and thousands lost their shirts. This account of the South Sea Bubble is not just the story of a huge scam, but is also the story of the birth of modern financial capitalism. These dreamers and fraudsters may have bankrupted Britain, but they made the world rich. Speaker: Tom Levenson is Professor of Science Writing at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, teaching mostly in the Graduate Program in Science Writing. He has recently published his newest book, Money for Nothing, June, 2020, on the South Sea Bubble, the Scientific Revolution, and the birth of the modern idea of money. Levenson's career has been split between writing, mostly long-form but including some science journalism, and documentary film making, emphasizing books for the last decade. One of his most recent work is The Hunt for Vulcan, (Random House, 2015), short-listed for the Royal Society's science book award. It's a cautionary tale of the discovery and undiscovery of a planet that should have been there, but wasn't. His Newton and the Counterfeiter (Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, 2009) centers on Isaac Newton's second career as a real-world scientific detective. Einstein in Berlin, (Bantam, 2003, reissued in 2017 by Random House in its first electronic book), is a critically acclaimed account of Albert Einstein's eighteen years in the German capital.

Mauricio de Medina nos relata "La compañía de los mares del sur" , esta es la historia de una burbuja financiera que ocurrió en Gran Bretaña a principios del siglo XVIII, y que condujo al llamado crack de 1720. La burbuja especulativa se produjo alrededor de las acciones de la Compañía de los mares del sur (South Sea Company), una compañía de comercio internacional que tenía el monopolio del comercio británico con las colonias españolas de Sudamérica y las Indias Occidentales. Esta burbuja involucró a las altas esferas de la política inglesa, incluso Isaac Newton fue socio de las acciones de esta empresa y perdió alrededor de 20,000 libras esterlinas al dejarse llevar por esta ola de especulación y avaricia. ¡Dale play e incrementa tu IQ financiero! Para acceder a videos, tips, ebooks, cursos de educación financiera e información útil visita: https://www.facebook.com/DeMedinaMau/ https://twitter.com/DeMedinaMau https://www.instagram.com/demedinamau/ https://www.linkedin.com/in/mauricio-de-medina O visita: https://www.mauriciodemedina.com Aprende, ahorra e invierte.

In this episode of the @VersusHistory Podcast, we are delighted to interview Thomas Levenson, Professor of Science Writing at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT). His new book ‘Money for Nothing' is the remarkable tale of the world’s first-ever financial crash, which took place 300 years ago, in the year 1720. It tells the captivating stories of a host of entertaining characters who became caught up in the world’s first financial bubble; with luminaries such as Daniel Defoe, Alexander Pope and even Isaac Newton losing out in a scheme that was ‘too good to be true’. ‘Money for Nothing’ explores how the scientific revolution extended to matters far beyond the flight of a cannonball or the dynamics of the tides, extending into the idea that empiricism and maths could make sense of everyday life; and how the invention of modern ideas about money both made the world rich and expose us to predictable hazards that we have, to date, three centuries on, failed to fully prepare for. The South Sea Company was formed to monopolize trade with Spain’s American colonies. But it had almost no ships and did precious little trade. So it turned its hand to playing money games, until, in 1720, it launched the first great stock market boom, fraud and bust, in what is now remembered as the South Sea Bubble. The financial engineering pioneered in the Bubble didn’t go away. Instead, it evolved into the same kinds of market manipulation that brought the world’s economy crashing down in 2008. In the moment, though, it all seemed to work brilliantly. Exactly 300 years ago, in June 1720, South Sea shares hit their peak, a ten-fold gain. Britain’s punters—up to and including the King’s mistresses—had grown incredibly, impossibly rich—on paper. And then the carousel stopped and thousands lost their shirts. Isaac Newton, the Duke of Portland (England’s richest man) and others lost heavily. Tom Levenson's superb account of the South Sea bubble dissects that huge scam—but that tale isn’t just a disaster story. It is also the story of the birth of modern financial capitalism: the idea that you can invest in future prosperity and that governments can borrow money to make things happen, like funding the rise of British naval and mercantile power. These dreamers and fraudsters may have ruined Britons, but they made the world rich. For terms of use, please visit www.versushistory.com

This week we're marking 300 years since one of the most infamous stock market crashes in English history. It was a bubble fuelled by wild speculation and driven by dubious morals – and a bubble which ruined the fortunes of many investors, including some whose estates are now cared for by English Heritage. Joining us to discuss the South Sea Company stock market bubble – and crash – are properties historians team leader Dr Andrew Hann and Dr Helen Paul, who's a Lecturer in Economics and Economic History at the University of Southampton. To learn about the impact of the South Sea Bubble at Brodsworth Hall and Gardens in South Yorkshire, go to www.english-heritage.org.uk/visit/places/brodsworth-hall-and-gardens/history

Scott Bosworth from Dimensional Fund Advisors (DFA) joins the DHGWA Insights Podcast to tell the incredible (and disastrous!) tale of Sir Isaac Netwon’s Investment in the South Sea Company. The story illustrates how our psychology, although it means well, can lead us to make sub-optimal, puzzling, and in some cases just plain wrong decisions that can hinder our financial success. Transcript:  DHG Wealth Advisors Podcast Episode 09: Psychology & Investing

Welcome to Finance and Fury, The Furious Friday Edition This week – see what lessons can be learned from - Last week - Story of Financial alchemy in its early days with the SSC bubble Been many bubbles since then – The Markets have a Cycle to them History of the last 90 years – exclude wars and a few other drops that weren’t the result of a bubble bursting – you have 1929 crash (-46%), credit squeeze of 1961 (-23%), OPEC stagflation of 1970s (-59%), 1987 crash (-50%) and the 1990 recession that followed (-32%), tech bubble in 2000s (-22%), GFC of 2008/9 (-55%) - Good news - Markets do recover – we are back to all-time highs for the index - but keep repeating the same cycles – debt being flooded into markets – leverage grows, investment prices rise and seeing the artificial price rises, people jump in to not miss the boat – no pun intended – especially as we will be looking at the SSC bubble last week in relation to these common factors over time But like any cycle – what goes up must come down – and there are elements to each stage - Core to the SSC bubble – wasn’t just an individual (John Blunt) but also a group of individuals who saw a way to make themselves filthy rich – and the general public who didn’t want to miss out Takes a few elements for a bubble to form and pop – almost like a perfect storm Three major parties involved when it comes to the elements of a bubble cycle – those facilitating it, those driving it (and will profit from it) and those looking to partake to not miss out – a lot of whom do so when it’s too late (those who lose from it) Sometimes the first two are the same entity – or working together For the SSC – Facilitating it was Harley and the Crown, then Blunt saw this as an opportunity to make himself filthy rich, driving the bubble – as he dreamed up a scheme of the market and public perception manipulation This is when the prices went up by a lot – but continues to climb when all three elements come together When everyone is jumping in out of emotions (or greed) to get rich – but got the opposite outcome once the bubble popped Which is when the fundamental price gain factors (leverage) start to run out of benefits – And the amount of money the public has available compared to banks/central banks isn't the same – we cant create or reduce the amount of money at a whim The First Element – Facilitators – Normally a bigger entity – like a Government through legislation or a Central bank through leverage/money-printing/monetary policy – essentially – the creators of a scheme The whole scheme for the SSC was thought up by a Government official and a corrupt businessman – John Blunt Blunt's first scheme – use those technically worthless army debentures (loans) and made them attractive – so the price went up Knew that the offer to do a swap at under market value would be massively in demand – and increase the price of the army debentures – so before he announced this scheme – he went out and bought massive amounts of these army debentures – Then he announced so the value of the debentures went through the roof due to people trying to get them to trade for his companies shares – then could trade the technically worthless debentures back to the government for the land that he wanted in Ireland – this was technically illegal – but he was lending the government money – so no action was taken in the end This was technically a mini-bubble But was Similar to the bankers doing swaps on Synthetic CDOs in the GCF – was peddling something worthless and pumping the price up using leveraged strategies – treating some of the highest risk mortgages as AAA credit How many of the masterminds of any bubble go to jail? The banks are some of the Governments biggest donors – so maybe a scapegoat or two – but never the culprits For the SSC – A large part of this bubble was to create a scheme and to never report the truth to the public – but keep confidence high to make sure prices would continue to rise – so those involved could continue to profit If the truth is ever known – the jig is up – So had to keep the population in the dark – and nothing has changed – we are all busy, and economics/finance can be hard to understand unless you devote a large chunk of your life to it - Legislation can be another major element – and the adverse effects Initially – the SSC was created by a Public-Private partnership – to take over all the Crown's debt The only reason that it looked like a good investment was the monopoly trading rights that were provided by the state – created artificial demand for the company – but the underlying profits were non-existent Then – after the price rises - SSC - had its copy cats – others started their own share scheme – started popping up everywhere – crazy ones – like flying machines – so money going into SSC started to cease Bubble Act was put into place in 1720 – which forbade the creation of joint-stock companies without royal charter, was promoted by the South Sea Company itself before its collapse All of this had another unintended effect/consequence – as other schemes which people thought could make them more money instead were starting to take off – Essentially the banning of every other scheme except the SSC – but due to this act – had opposite effect – which was those who invested in the now banned schemes lost their money - so had to sell their SSC stock to make it up – as they were otherwise broke In the modern-day – many bits of monetary policy or legislation create bubbles Lesson - Don’t trust the government is legislating in your best interest – or monetary policy is being conducted for your benefit - Looking at the payments that politicians get after they leave office when they pass favourable bits of legislation Clinton – was getting $500k a pop for a 20 minute speech from the same banks that he allowed to be deregulated In 1995 Clinton loosened housing rules by rewriting the Community Reinvestment Act, which put added pressure on banks to lend in low-income neighbourhoods – the HUD departments regulations also changed where Fannie mae/Freddie mac had to provide a minimum of 30% of loans to low-income households – which banks knew they would lose money on these through defaults so wanted some way to make money off them along with having guarantees that if these loans went belly up (as they would) – banks liquidity would be safe – Then a few years later – under pressure from the same banks - Passed the The Gramm–Leach–Bliley Act, also known as the Financial Services Modernization Act of 1999 - provided the removal of the Glass-Steagall act (allowing investment and commercial banks to operate together) and also exempted credit-default swaps from regulation - allowed banks expand off balance sheet derivative positions with no reporting obligations Then – Central banks – and monetary policy – anyone who owned property or shares since 2009 has done very well out of these policies to fix the problem by buying assets and increasing prices artificially – but those that don’t still have to flip the bill in taxes and are priced out of affordability – ill cover the new Fed plan in the next crash in another episode soon Thing to learn from the first element of bubbles – Governments aren’t your friend – but those who pay them the most and can provide the most benefit – Obviously, they won’t say this to your face – the perception is that they are here to help to get votes – but the outcome is the complete opposite Requires some level headed thinking when things seem too good to be true The Second Element - Those driving the bubbles – By again, providing confidence and price gains for the public’s perception Government guarantees – backing – for SSC – back in 1717 – King George became the SSC leader – then politicians were bribed with cash ($2-3m each today's dollars) along with getting shares for free – then due to political involvement the company became too big to fail – if the company failed - prestige would fail and the powers that be would lose money – sound familiar to the 2009 crash? – but it was after this public perception the SSC price started to rise – but by breaking the agreements and letting their prices rise beyond the government debt backing it – but the government officials didn’t care – they were going to get rich – The driving factor is confidence – whether it be fake or real – doesn’t matter – has the same effect of stimulating demand Confidence is key for bubbles – But the effects of public officials getting into the shares and King George taking over leadership of the company gave the public the perception that the shares must be a good thing - a lot of confidence in the shares Effect - share price rose from £114 to £330 – but the next month the shares went down to £310 So confidence was slightly lost – and demand went down – which couldn’t happen Leverage buy ins - new scheme – buy the shares with 20% down and regular payments every 2 months (similar to how warrants work today) – created leverage on leverage – allowed people to buy way more than they could afford – Effect - Could by 5 times the number of shares today with only 20% down - very leveraged and driven by greed – if people saw the price go down then people may stop buying Price quickly rose to £550 – but then soon after prices dropped again to £510 Lending to people to buy - – Loan people the money to buy the shares – loans from SSC to individuals – then they would buy their own shares back off them and push the prices higher Effect - Prices went to £600 – seeing this – people wanted to get in – greed took over rational sense Lesson – price gains are not a sign of a good investment – especially when leverage/debt is the factor that creates the growth Saw last week – SSC went from £100 - £1,000 within around a year – was it due to the spectacular performance? No - the company was technically losing money from operating – Was due to the last element – the public demand on top of the first two elements The Last Element – The general public - Those who mostly get caught out – but also are pushing the prices higher The first two elements have the same effect – to artificially stimulate demand – This creates a situation where the public has Confidence in investments continuing to rise – through conflating a rising asset price to a good investment – If the shares of a company go up by 20%, 60%, 100% - you might think that the company is doing really well But the share price doesn’t reflect the company’s performance – just the demand for the share Can be out of expected performance – or just blind faith and that people don’t want to miss the future gains – like in the case of the SSC – and also a lot of the largest shares listed in the US markets For the SSC - in England at the time – not enough money in whole country to prop up prices – so the - £60m to the market cap of £300m – due to the leveraged nature of the funds Modern day derivates and price elevations are a good example of this The Inevitable Consequence - The bubble busting – Too good to be true turns out to be true –  fear and panic spreading For SSC - Risk was that when the real information gets out to public and confidence is lost – to those paying attention – due to them not making any money – mass sale orders come through – then the prices drop – then the rest of the market out of fear - loss aversion – sell as well – hence the bubble bursts – For SSC – the offers that were too good to be true were the issue of shares at the top of the market at £1,000 – created a massive sale for profit-taking – those who bought the shares with 20% down at £500 – or earlier But also - What broke the bubble – Blunt offered a 30% p.a. dividend – which woke up the people – losing confidence – fell hundreds of pounds – In 3 weeks – went from over £1,000 to £150 – bankruptcies and suicides were rampant The economic effects were widespread – required BOE to buy the shares back – at the market prices This trend becomes Inevitable – a threshold of people catch on and sell – or a monetary body – either a group of banks or central bank restrict credit – For example - 1929 was a group of banks recalling margin loans all at once- 1961 was Aus central bank tightening credit growth due to property prices going up Over time – I will do a deeper dive into each of these bubble events – but for today – that’s all – thanks for listening Thank you for listening to today's episode. If you want to get in contact, you can do so here: http://financeandfury.com.au/contact/  

Welcome to Finance and Fury, The Furious Friday Edition Today - Lesson from the past – Story of Financial alchemy in its early days Specifically – turning debt into equity – i.e. financial alchemy Story Starts - In 1700s the English Crown had amassed massive debts – all from fighting wars with the French and Spanish, also a massive civil war – along with colonialist intentions – When in August 1710 Robert Harley was appointed Chancellor of the Exchequer Position - senior official within the Government of the United Kingdom and head of Her Majesty's Treasury When he took over – got a bit of a shock - £5,000 in assets - £9,000,000 in debt – to give an idea of this size – that debt is still being paid down – last announcement in 2015 Politically – things were also a mess - At the time – two parties – Tory’s and the Wigs – very bipartisan who couldn’t get anything done – raising taxes to pay this was out – so turned to the Bank of England The government had already become reliant on the Bank of England – back then up until around 30 years ago - a privately owned company BOE was chartered in 1694 – chartered 16 years previously by the Wigs, which had obtained a monopoly as the lender to Westminster - in return for arranging and managing loans to the government But in this time period – the Tory party was in power – so the Wig controlled BOE was offering massive rates – and the government had become dissatisfied with the service it was receiving and Harley was actively seeking new ways to improve the national finances Couldn’t raise funds from other European nations – was at war with most – so turned to John Blunt – was a crafty man Blunt saw this as an opportunity to make himself filthy rich – dreamed up a scheme – Back Story on Blunt - Before this moment in time – Blunt had a company Hallow Sword Company – monopoly of selling swords to Gov and the army – Cooked up a scheme in the past – wanted to buy land in Ireland which was owned by the government – but needed funds – so he had a plan – trade share in hallow sword company at under market value for army debentures (debt) – but can’t repossess the debentures – so made them technically worthless – but knew that the offer to do a swap at under market value would be massively in demand – and increase the price of the army debentures – so before he announced this scheme – he went out and bought massive amounts of these army debentures – Then he announced so the value of the debentures went through the roof due to people trying to get them to trade for his companies shares – then could trade the technically worthless debentures back to the government for the land that he wanted in Ireland – this was technically illegal – but he was lending the government money – so no action was taken in the end Similar to the bankers doing swaps on CDOs in the GCF – anyway As blunt was helping the government – Harley had his man – as he needed funds – Came up with the South Sea Company  (officially The Governor and Company of the merchants of Great Britain, trading to the South Seas and other parts of America, and for the encouragement of fishing) Was a British joint-stock company founded in 1711, created as a public-private partnership to consolidate and reduce the cost of the national debt How? Made a plan – the trading company – Scheme would be similar to what blunt did with his own company – Anyone who held Government debt would be able to trade the debt for shares in the SSC – then Government would pay the SSC 6% interest on the debt they took over – about £500,000 p.a. To make it enticing - South Seas Co was given monopoly on trading in south seas – and tried to get hype around the shares - convincing that the shares in the company were going to skyrocket – here was a chance to make millions – the term millionaire was coined in this time period with the SSC stock rising – which happens later in the story East India Company was doing well – and public perception was that the SSC company was going to boom like the EI company But the promise of the trading profits of the SSC was a scam though – South America was run by the French and the Spanish who the British were at war with – needed peace – but the majority in the house of lords didn’t want this Queen Anne was approached by Harley and Blunt – and got 12 more lords in the house of lords – lords was all it took – no voting – blunt got Queen Anne to push through these lords to get a majority vote for peace – but the peace deal only let 1 ship a year into the ports – but the public was never told – Had famous authors and others push the scheme still 1714 – King George took over with Anne’s death – But the wigs took over at the same time – so Tory’s no longer in power – and Harley was kicked out – so Blunt took action - Got the king to invest into SSC – forgave two years worth of interest payments that they owed – but in return – was allowed to issue more shares in the SSC 10,000,000 of new stock was issues – which was massive – half the size of all the companies shares in the whole of Britain – this on a company that to date- had only lost money on trading This Convinced the government to continue to offload more government debt to the company – as they now had more shares to offset it – Put in perspective – say today that one company was half the size of the ASX but with no income (only losses) – the Government just turned around and made it bigger by trading more of their debt with it (Government bonds) 1717 – King became the SSC leader – company became too big to fail – if the company failed - prestige would fail – From around 1719 – the shares in the SSC started rising £100 to £114 pretty quickly – the previous agreement was that the market cap (number of shares to the share price) had to be equivalent to the government debt – £100 of equity for £100 of debt – almost the same to banks today – look at their financial sheets – the assets and liability offsets But at a £14 difference in price rise – the company could sell these shares at a profit and pocket the difference – as with this price rise they didn’t take on any new debt Gave Blunt ideas – the company still wasn’t making money remember – Now decided to take on the £31,000,000 debt the government racked up by 1719 – if successful – make the SCC he biggest financial institution in the world – But Needed to convince the Gov to let them take over the debt – so to convince in this case was to bribe – with about $2m each today worth of bribes – But still wasn’t enough – as the BOE was also another contender to sell the debts to and the Wigs were favouring this - so offered them shares in the SSC –– In the end – SSC got the rights to consolidate the government’s debt – Share swaps took place But the effects of public officials getting into the shares and King George taking over leadership of the company gave the public the perception that the shares must be a good thing - a lot of confidence in the shares Within a few months the share price rose to £330 – but the next month the shares went down to £310 – which wasn’t good news – remember – this company didn’t make money – the only way to make money for investors was a price rise from speculation – or more irrational purchases – The share price couldn’t decline otherwise the scam would be up – So Blunt Came up with a new scheme – buy the shares with 20% down and regular payments every 2 months (similar to how warrants work today) – created leverage on leverage – allowed people to buy way more than they could afford – Could buy 5 times the number of shares today with only 20% down But as long as stock prices went up – people could sell a small amount every 2 months to fund their next repayment on the shares – the amount of leverage went to on average 5 times the amount of shares compared to the money they had in the bank Created further greed in the market - When people profited or others felling like the missed out – they bought more stock The new scheme worked - Price quickly rose to £550 – but then soon after prices dropped again to £510 – Remember – this cant happen otherwise the scheme would go bust – very leveraged and driven by greed – if people saw the price go down then people may stop buying Blunt came up with the Next scheme – Loan people the money to buy the shares – loans from SSC to individuals – then they would buy their own shares back off them and push the prices higher Prices went to £600 – seeing this – people wanted to get in – greed took over rational sense – even Isaac Newton wanted to get in – buying massive amounts of shares – about £20,000 worth which he lost in the end All of this had another unintended effect/consequence – others started their own share scheme – started popping up everywhere – crazy ones – like flying machines – so money going into SSC started to cease – as other schemes which people thought could make them more money instead were starting to take off – Similar to Crypto – BTC did so well so others pumped money into it – then all of a sudden new coins emerged – so the money started to flow into these as well But in England at the time – not enough money in the whole country to prop up prices – so the Bubble Act was put into place in 1720 – which forbade the creation of joint-stock companies without a royal charter, was promoted by the South Sea Company itself before its collapse. Essentially the banning of every other scheme except the SSC – but due to this act – had opposite effect – which was those who invested in the now banned schemes lost their money - so had to sell their SSC stock to make it up – as they were otherwise broke Prices initially Dropped for the SSC - But no rivals on the market – so shares in one week went from £503 to £830 due to removal of other share schemes – But remember – this company was highly leveraged – not making any money – company valued at £300,000,000 – almost 10 times the size of the £31,000,000 pounds of government debt that the valuation should have been based around – all the money in Britain was around £60,000,000 – Based around current markets – would be $85trillion USD – which sounds huge – but derivative exposure dwarves this today All of a sudden – prices started to decline – so blunt started to issues more shares- at £1000 per share – offering more incentives – 10% upfront with no payments for a year – Hype was so strong – sold straight away – those who bought early made massive amounts of money It was at this point that Blunt and a lot of politicians then he sold off a lot of their shares – the bubble was about to burst – The top of the market at £1,000 – created a massive sale for profit taking – those who bought the shares with 20% down at £500 – or earlier What broke the bubble – Blunt offered a 30% p.a. dividend – which woke up the people – losing confidence – fell hundreds of pounds – In 3 weeks – went from over £1,000 to £150 – bankruptcies and suicides were rampant But what happened – bailouts – bank of England and East India company share swaps – by Walpole – which is another story The economic effects were widespread - What does this all have to do with today? Greed – bubbles, BTC, leverage, Corporate debt fuelling markets – Central banking policies – fuelling markets with leverage Political bribes and self-interest as well – Cover this in another episode Thank you for listening to today's episode. If you want to get in contact you can do so here: http://financeandfury.com.au/contact/  

In Part 2 of this special four-part podcast series, Richard Lummis and myself consider business leadership from a different angle, that of great economic disaster. This podcast series was inspired by the Great Courses series of lectures entitled, Crashes and Crisis: Lessons form a History of Financial Disasters, hosted by Professor Connel Fullenkamp. In this podcast series, we will consider the Dutch Tulip Bubble from the 1630s, the South Sea Bubble of 1720, the Mississippi Bubble of 1720 and the 1907 Panic. Today we continue with the South Sea Company Bubble of 1720. Fullenkamp said of the scandal, “The South Sea Company went from an obscure British trading organization in the early 18th century, with a share price of £128, to England’s most important company, with its shares trading at more than £1000—over the course of just 6 months. The company was at the center of one of history’s most interesting stock bubbles, one largely built on stock price manipulation and corruption. The South Sea bubble is a complex, fascinating story about the early days of the stock market in England and a cautionary tale about the dangers of mixing private enterprise and government finance.” What does the South Sea bubble teach us about the nature of bubbles and crashes? Fullenkamp identified three general points. First, “When governments get too involved in any asset market, there’s bound to be danger. People interpret the government presence as a sign that the asset can’t lose, so they’re willing to overpay for it .” Second, the South Sea bubble, similar to the  tulip bubble that preceded it, “was made possible by easy credit. The ability to buy stocks on credit, with absurdly low down payments, made people all too willing to buy the company’s shares.” The third and final point is that “Market manipulation can, and does, play a role in bubbles. And manipulation can be difficult to detect until after a bubble bursts.” Focusing on the fraud and market manipulations of the South Sea Bubble, James Narron and Richard Skeie, in their article “Crisis Chronicles: The South Sea Bubble of 1720—Repackaging Debt and the Current Reach for Yield”, found four factors. (1) Start with insider trading, here by picking up the British National Debt; (2) Pay bribes to those who have to approve the deal, here Members of Parliament; (3) Ban rivals, here the South Sea Company persuaded Parliament to pass the ‘Bubble Act’ which banned corporations in competition with the South Sea Company; and (4) Repackage worthless old debt for new investors, here think “Asset-backed securitization and collateralized debt obligations” in 1720 and you begin to see the problem. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Detailed Notes from Episode 6 Episode 6 - Momentum: The Anomaly that Persist Fri Aug 23, 2019 Host Deepak Shenoy (CEO) interviewing Prashanth Krishna (Trading, Momentum Portfolio) on the Momentum Strategy and why it’s the anomaly that persists. Capitalmind offers the Momentum Portfolio as part of Capitalmind Premium (subscription service) in Wealth and as part of our Wealth Management Service.  Read full transcript: https://www.capitalmind.in/2019/08/podcast-momentum-the-anomaly-that-persists/   What’s the Definition of Momentum Stocks moving in one direction continue to do so. Speculation? No, Momentum is a factor identifying a stock that is going up and that continues to do so.  As part of Momentum, we are not asking why - we’re just identifying when this trend is happening and when it’s stopped. Same exercise on the way down as well. We are betting on the trend of the market, not taking a contrarian view.   Why does Momentum work? We have research going back decades (generally in the US and other developed markets) that clearly shows that momentum works.  We can show the persistence and impact of momentum but the reasons aren’t very convincing (Rory Sutherland anecdote on knowing something works but not having the exact reason why).  One of the best reasons I’ve come across attributes this to behavioral factors. Investors underestimate at beginning and over-estimate at the end.  Another is asymmetric information - if you know or have figured out something about a stock you will start to acquire more and more shares. As information trickles in, people will jump on the bandwagon and others will replicate. The stock goes from under-information to over-participation driven by FOMO and greed. Isaac Newton story about the South Sea Company, He got in, made 100%, got out, but jumped in once again on peer pressure and then eventually lost everything. Momentum has an end too   How Long do you hold a stock for and what are the Portfolio Construction Strategy, Diversification criteria: We don’t buy for life like Buffett. The average holding period is a couple of months. We know something about the stock but simply not enough to make long term hold decisions Price is the key, price action is the trigger for our investment and exit choices. We don’t want a low liquidity stock We would rather not have a high volatility stock either that keeps hitting upper and/or lower circuits. The best fit is a stock that goes up steadily without making waves So avoid the parabolic rise? Yes, HEG is an example that after it hit all time highs it was subject to indefinite growth style justifications. You can’t start with momentum and then transition to fundamentals. 25-30 stocks is an optimal choice. Even a 50% fall in Vakrangee where couldn’t get out.only caused a drop of 1-2% of your overall capital which is still manageable.   How do you Rebalance? Rebalancing is meaningful - selling and buying has costs, taxes and slippage. Monthly is a sensible level. Let it ride for a month unless there is extreme news. At the next month, re-visit is the stock still worth holding.   What do you do in times like these (months leading up to Aug 2019) when there’s not enough momentum   In Bear runs like the current environment, we stay in cash if we can’t find 30 stocks.    If we only find 20 stocks (instead of 30), we have 33% in cash.    Momentum is often viewed as a negative because of the dangers of manipulation (promoters and operators driving prices). Since you don’t have filters that can track manipulation - how do you deal with this? Manipulation happens at every level, at accounting, price, balance sheet - even an analysis of fundamentals have risk from misleading or false financial statements. Manipulation is easier in a low volume stock. If you filter on high volume, it’s tougher to get caught in a pump and dump.  Between filters and diversification, we avoid mistakes or avoid mistakes that we can’t recover from. In Vakrangee - we rode the stock on the way up and then down as well! Once the lower circuit hits, you can’t exit no matter what your back test claims.   Do you get time to exit? We’re scared of parabolic charts - they become waterfall when the stock comes down. The lower circuits often kick in (unless it’s an F&O stock) so it’s not easy to get out. Fortunately, momentum normally exhausts over time so it gives you down to exit.  It’s the series of small waterfalls kills an investor in a stock.   Pitfalls or Things to Watch out for   How will you build your version of Momentum? If you’re not looking at volume filters - that’s a big risk.  What’s the universe? Momentum today would be say 50% in large and 50% mid cap. Outside of a wholesale fraud, you should have regular market risk. When there’s a drawdown, will you have the conviction to exit the stock like your model tells you to or will you be loss averse? Alpha comes from behavior rather than the genius of the strategy. Have faith in the strategy. The biggest failure point is us.    What are the returns like? Return of this strategy is linked to the market. This isn’t a contrarian portfolio, In a bear market you don’t do great either. Above Nifty returns are achievable based on the track record. During the bull market days you could easily hit the higher end of this range and the numbers looked abnormally great in the short term. However, drawdowns are similar to Nifty. Your portfolio make-up changes from small to mid caps in the bull runs to larger companies in the bear market. You’ll know this is working when Momentum falls in line with Nifty even on the downside but has beats it during the upside.   This has played out in foreign markets as well? Yes, in US like markets we have some data going back nearly a century and this very much works. Low volatility strategies don’t always prosper but Momentum is an anomaly the persists.  Just buying small cap stocks looks great in bull markets but risk adjusted doesn’t really do better than large cap. Momentum gives alpha even after adjusting for risk.   Next Steps: If you’re interested in learning and doing this yourself Capitalmind Premium articles on Momentum (we have a smallcase) https://www.capitalmind.in/momentum-portfolio/   And if you would like us to invest for you, we offer the Momentum to our Capitalmind Wealth customers (Wealth Management/PMS) as well.  

In 1720 a rash of market speculation (or stock-jobbing as it was called at the time) swept through England. Everyone, it seemed was desperate to get their hands on stock in The South Seas Company. Within the span of a year the bubble had rapidly expanded and even more rapidly burst. But what was The South Sea Company, what caused the bubble, and what does any of it have to do with Louisiana? All these questions and more are answered in this episode of Bad Ideas!

In 1720 verloor Isaac Newton veel geld. Hij had geïnvesteerd in de South Sea Company. Het bedrijf handelde onder andere in slaven, zette een dubieuze financieringsmethode op met de Britse overheid, belandde in een bubbel en de ballon klapte. Newton verklaarde dat hij de bewegingen van hemellichamen kon berekenen, maar niet de gekte van mensen. De crypto-manie van de laatste maanden bewijst dat we nog steeds niet de gekte van mensen kunnen berekenen.

Episode 24 brings us back to our most controversial episode format: the “solo Meb” show. Listeners seem to either love and loathe this style of show. If you fall into the “loathe” camp, it’s a short episode so the pain is limited. But hopefully you will listen, as Meb dives into the fascinating, and possibly timely, subject of bubbles. The quick takeaway? Using a trend following approach would have helped you reduce drawdowns as popping market bubbles ravaged portfolios. And this would have helped you achieve investing’s main goal: surviving another day. Meb then dives in, first defining bubbles, then referencing three of the most famous bubbles in history: the South Sea Company bubble, the Mississippi bubble, and the Dutch tulip mania, each of which saw drawdowns of 90%. Meb dives deeper into the South Sea Company bubble. In short, the South Sea Company was a huge pump-and-dump scheme – catching none other than Sir Isaac Newton in its carnage. From here, Meb discusses strategies for capturing the upside of bubbles while protecting yourself from the fallout. One solution? Trend following, using the 10-month simple moving average. It does a great job of reducing volatility and drawdowns, and improving returns. Meb ends the show by revisiting the South Sea Company bubble, this time putting an actual figure on Newton’s losses, and comparing them to what a trend follower would have made. What’s the difference? Find out in Episode 24.

Melvyn Bragg and his guests discuss The South Sea Bubble, the speculation mania in early 18th-century England which ended in the financial ruin of many of its investors. The South Sea Company was founded in 1711 with a view to restructuring government debt and restoring public credit. The company would ostensibly trade with South America, hence its name; and indeed, it did trade in slaves for the Spanish market even after the Bubble burst in 1720. People from all walks of life bought shares in the South Sea Company, from servants to gentry, and it was said the entire country was gripped by South Sea speculation mania. When the shares crashed and the company collapsed there was a public outcry and many people faced financial ruin, although some investors sold before the crash and made substantial amounts of money. For example, the bookseller Thomas Guy made his fortune and founded a hospital in his name the following year. But how did such a financial crisis develop and were there any lessons learnt following this early example of a stock market boom and bust?With:Anne Murphy Senior Lecturer in History at the University of HertfordshireHelen Paul Lecturer in Economics and Economic History at the University of SouthamptonRoey Sweet Head of the School of History at the University of LeicesterProducer: Natalia Fernandez.

Melvyn Bragg and his guests discuss The South Sea Bubble, the speculation mania in early 18th-century England which ended in the financial ruin of many of its investors. The South Sea Company was founded in 1711 with a view to restructuring government debt and restoring public credit. The company would ostensibly trade with South America, hence its name; and indeed, it did trade in slaves for the Spanish market even after the Bubble burst in 1720. People from all walks of life bought shares in the South Sea Company, from servants to gentry, and it was said the entire country was gripped by South Sea speculation mania. When the shares crashed and the company collapsed there was a public outcry and many people faced financial ruin, although some investors sold before the crash and made substantial amounts of money. For example, the bookseller Thomas Guy made his fortune and founded a hospital in his name the following year. But how did such a financial crisis develop and were there any lessons learnt following this early example of a stock market boom and bust? With: Anne Murphy Senior Lecturer in History at the University of Hertfordshire Helen Paul Lecturer in Economics and Economic History at the University of Southampton Roey Sweet Head of the School of History at the University of Leicester Producer: Natalia Fernandez.

George Frideric HANDEL 1685-1759Our version ofAllemande in Am (HWV 478)George Frideric HANDEL 1685-1759© 2012 Shiloh Worship Music COPY FREELY;This Recording is copyrighted to prevent misuse, however,permission is granted for non-commercial copying-Radio play permitted. Www.ShilohWorshipMusic.com Georg Friedrich Händel (1685-1759)George Frideric Handel(from Wikipedia) George Frideric Handel, born in the same year as Johann Sebastian Bach and Domenico Scarlatti. By Thomas Hudson (1749)George Frideric Handel SignatureGeorge Frideric Handel (German: Georg Friedrich Händel; pronounced [ˈhɛndəl]) (23 February 1685 – 14 April 1759) was a German-British Baroque composer, famous for his operas, oratorios, anthems and organ concertos. Handel was born in 1685, in a family indifferent to music. He received critical musical training in Halle, Hamburg and Italy before settling in London (1712) and becoming a naturalised British subject in 1727.[1] By then he was strongly influenced by the great composers of the Italian Baroque and the middle-German polyphonic choral tradition.Within fifteen years, Handel, a dramatic genius, started three commercial opera companies to supply the English nobility with Italian opera, but the public came to hear the vocal bravura of the soloists rather than the music. In 1737 he had a physical breakdown, changed direction creatively and addressed the middle class. As Alexander's Feast (1736) was well received, Handel made a transition to English choral works. After his success with Messiah (1742) he never performed an Italian opera again. Handel was only partly successful with his performances of English Oratorio on mythical and biblical themes, but when he arranged a performance of Messiah to benefit the Foundling Hospital (1750) the critique ended. The pathos of Handel's oratorios is an ethical one. They are hallowed not by liturgical dignity but by the moral ideals of humanity.[2] Almost blind, and having lived in England for almost fifty years, he died a respected and rich man.Handel is regarded as one of the greatest composers of all time, with works such as Water Music, Music for the Royal Fireworks and Messiah remaining popular. Handel composed more than forty operas in over thirty years, and since the late 1960s, with the revival of baroque music and original instrumentation, interest in Handel's operas has grown. His operas contain remarkable human characterisation—especially for a composer not known for his love affairs.Early yearsHandel's baptismal registration (Marienbibliothek in Halle)Handel was born in 1685 in Halle, Duchy of Magdeburg, to Georg Händel and Dorothea Taust.[3] His father, 63 when his son was born, was an eminent barber-surgeon who served to the court of Saxe-Weissenfels and the Margraviate of Brandenburg.[4] According to Handel's first biographer, John Mainwaring, he "had discovered such a strong propensity to Music, that his father who always intended him for the study of the Civil Law, had reason to be alarmed. He strictly forbade him to meddle with any musical instrument but Handel found means to get a little clavichord privately convey'd to a room at the top of the house. To this room he constantly stole when the family was asleep".[5] At an early age Handel became a skillful performer on the harpsichord and pipe organ.[6]Händel-Haus (2009) – birthplace of George Frideric HandelEntrance of Teatro del Cocomero in FlorenceHandel and his father travelled to Weissenfels to visit either Handel's half-brother, Carl, or nephew, Georg Christian,[7] who was serving as valet to Duke Johann Adolf I.[8] Handel and the duke convinced his father to allow him to take lessons in musical composition and keyboard technique from Friedrich Wilhelm Zachow, the organist of the Lutheran Marienkirche. He learned about harmony and contemporary styles, analysed sheet music scores, learned to work fugue subjects, and to copy music. In 1698 Handel played for Frederick I of Prussia and met Giovanni Battista Bononcini in Berlin.From Halle to ItalyThe Hamburg Opera am Gänsemarkt in 1726In 1702, following his father's wishes, Handel started studying law under Christian Thomasius at the University of Halle;[9] and also earned an appointment for one year as the organist in the former cathedral, by then an evangelical reformed church. Handel seems to have been unsatisfied and in 1703, he accepted a position as violinist and harpsichordist in the orchestra of the Hamburg Oper am Gänsemarkt.[10] There he met the composers Johann Mattheson, Christoph Graupner and Reinhard Keiser. His first two operas, Almira and Nero, were produced in 1705.[11] He produced two other operas, Daphne and Florindo, in 1708. It is unclear whether Handel directed these performances.According to Mainwaring, in 1706 Handel travelled to Italy at the invitation of Ferdinando de' Medici, but Mainwaring must have been confused. It was Gian Gastone de' Medici, whom Handel had met in 1703–1704 in Hamburg.[12] Ferdinando tried to make Florence Italy's musical capital, attracting the leading talents of his day. He had a keen interest in opera. In Italy Handel met librettist Antonio Salvi, with whom he later collaborated. Handel left for Rome and, since opera was (temporarily) banned in the Papal States, composed sacred music for the Roman clergy. His famous Dixit Dominus (1707) is from this era. He also composed cantatas in pastoral style for musical gatherings in the palaces of cardinals Pietro Ottoboni, Benedetto Pamphili and Carlo Colonna. Two oratorios, La Resurrezione and Il Trionfo del Tempo, were produced in a private setting for Ruspoli and Ottoboni in 1709 and 1710, respectively. Rodrigo, his first all-Italian opera, was produced in the Cocomero theatre in Florence in 1707.[13] Agrippina was first produced in 1709 at Teatro San Giovanni Grisostomo, the prettiest theatre at Venice, owned by the Grimanis. The opera, with a libretto by cardinal Vincenzo Grimani, and according to Mainwaring it ran for 27 nights successively. The audience, thunderstruck with the grandeur and sublimity of his style,[14] applauded for Il caro Sassone.Move to LondonGeorge Frideric Handel (left) and King George I on the River Thames, 17 July 1717, by Edouard Jean Conrad Hamman (1819–88).In 1710, Handel became Kapellmeister to German prince George, Elector of Hanover, who in 1714 would become King George I of Great Britain.[15] He visited Anna Maria Luisa de' Medici and her husband in Düsseldorf on his way to London in 1710. With his opera Rinaldo, based on La Gerusalemme Liberata by the Italian poet Torquato Tasso, Handel enjoyed great success, although it was composed quickly, with many borrowings from his older Italian works.[16] This work contains one of Handel's favourite arias, Cara sposa, amante cara, and the famous Lascia ch'io pianga.In 1712, Handel decided to settle permanently in England. He received a yearly income of £200 from Queen Anne after composing for her the Utrecht Te Deum and Jubilate, first performed in 1713.[17][18]One of his most important patrons was the young and wealthy Richard Boyle, 3rd Earl of Burlington.[19] For him Handel wrote Amadigi di Gaula, a magical opera, about a damsel in distress, based on the tragedy by Antoine Houdar de la Motte.The conception of an opera as a coherent structure was slow to capture Handel's imagination[20] and he renounced it for five years. In July 1717 Handel's Water Music was performed more than three times on the Thames for the King and his guests. It is said the compositions spurred reconciliation between the King and Handel.[21]Cannons (1717–18)Main article: Handel at CannonsThe Chandos portrait. The 1st Duke of Chandos was an important patron for Handel.In 1717 Handel became house composer at Cannons in Middlesex, where he laid the cornerstone for his future choral compositions in the twelve Chandos Anthems.[22] Romain Rolland stated that these anthems were as important for his oratorios as the cantatas were for his operas.[23] Another work he wrote for the Duke of Chandos, the owner of Cannons, was Acis and Galatea: during Handel's lifetime it was his most performed work. Winton Dean wrote, "the music catches breath and disturbs the memory".[24]In 1719 the Duke of Chandos became one of the main subscribers to Handel's new opera company, the Royal Academy of Music, but his patronage of music declined after he lost money in the South Sea bubble, which burst in 1720 in one of history's greatest financial cataclysms. Handel himself invested in South Sea stock in 1716, when prices were low[25] and sold before 1720.[26]Royal Academy of Music (1719–34)Main article: Royal Academy of Music (company)Handel House at 25 Brook Street, Mayfair, LondonIn May 1719 Lord Chamberlain Thomas Holles, the Duke of Newcastle ordered Handel to look for new singers.[27] Handel travelled to Dresden to attend the newly built opera. He saw Teofane by Antonio Lotti, and engaged the cast for the Royal Academy of Music, founded by a group of aristocrats to assure themselves a constant supply of baroque opera or opera seria. Handel may have invited John Smith, his fellow student in Halle, and his son Johann Christoph Schmidt, to become his secretary and amanuensis.[28] By 1723 he had moved into a Georgian house at 25 Brook Street, which he rented for the rest of his life.[29] This house, where he rehearsed, copied music and sold tickets, is now the Handel House Museum.[30] During twelve months between 1724 and 1725, Handel wrote three outstanding and successful operas, Giulio Cesare, Tamerlano and Rodelinda. Handel's operas are filled with da capo arias, such as Svegliatevi nel core. After composing Silete venti, he concentrated on opera and stopped writing cantatas. Scipio, from which the regimental slow march of the British Grenadier Guards is derived,[31] was performed as a stopgap, waiting for the arrival of Faustina Bordoni.In 1727 Handel was commissioned to write four anthems for the coronation ceremony of King George II. One of these, Zadok the Priest, has been played at every British coronation ceremony since.[32] In 1728 John Gay's The Beggar's Opera premiered at Lincoln's Inn Fields Theatre and ran for 62 consecutive performances, the longest run in theatre history up to that time.[citation needed] After nine years Handel's contract was ended but he soon started a new company.The Queen's Theatre at the Haymarket (now Her Majesty's Theatre), established in 1705 by architect and playwright John Vanbrugh, quickly became an opera house.[33] Between 1711 and 1739, more than 25 of Handel's operas premièred there.[34] In 1729 Handel became joint manager of the Theatre with John James Heidegger.A musical portrait of Frederick, Prince of Wales and his sisters by Philip Mercier, dated 1733, using Kew Palace as its plein-air backdropThe Queen's Theatre in the Haymarket in London by William CaponHandel travelled to Italy to engage seven new singers. He composed seven more operas, but the public came to hear the singers rather than the music.[35] After two commercially successful English oratorios Esther and Deborah, he was able to invest again in the South Sea Company. Handel reworked his Acis and Galatea which then became his most successful work ever. Handel failed to compete with the Opera of the Nobility, who engaged musicians such as Johann Adolf Hasse, Nicolo Porpora and the famous castrato Farinelli. The strong support by Frederick, Prince of Wales caused conflicts in the royal family. In March 1734 Handel directed a wedding anthem This is the day which the Lord hath made, and a serenata Parnasso in Festa for Anne of Hanover.[36]Opera at Covent Garden (1734–41)In 1733 the Earl of Essex received a letter with the following sentence: "Handel became so arbitrary a prince, that the Town murmurs". The board of chief investors expected Handel to retire when his contract ended, but Handel immediately looked for another theatre. In cooperation with John Rich he started his third company at Covent Garden Theatre. Rich was renowned for his spectacular productions. He suggested Handel use his small chorus and introduce the dancing of Marie Sallé, for whom Handel composed Terpsichore. In 1735 he introduced organ concertos between the acts. For the first time Handel allowed Gioacchino Conti, who had no time to learn his part, to substitute arias.[37] Financially, Ariodante was a failure, although he introduced ballet suites at the end of each act.[38] Alcina, his last opera with a magic content, and Alexander's Feast or the Power of Music based on John Dryden's Alexander's Feast starred Anna Maria Strada del Pò and John Beard.In April 1737, at age 52, Handel apparently suffered a stroke which disabled the use of four fingers on his right hand, preventing him from performing.[39] In summer the disorder seemed at times to affect his understanding. Nobody expected that Handel would ever be able to perform again. But whether the affliction was rheumatism, a stroke or a nervous breakdown, he recovered remarkably quickly .[40] To aid his recovery, Handel had travelled to Aachen, a spa in Germany. During six weeks he took long hot baths, and ended up playing the organ for a surprised audience.[41]Deidamia, his last and only baroque opera without an accompagnato, was performed three times in 1741. Handel gave up the opera business, while he enjoyed more success with his English oratorios.[citation needed]OratorioFurther information: List of Handel's OratoriosHandel by Philip MercierIl Trionfo del Tempo e del Disinganno, an allegory, Handel's first oratorio[42] was composed in Italy in 1707, followed by La Resurrezione in 1708 which uses material from the Bible. The circumstances of Esther and its first performance, possibly in 1718, are obscure.[43] Another 12 years had passed when an act of piracy caused him to take up Esther once again.[44] Three earlier performances aroused such interest that they naturally prompted the idea of introducing it to a larger public. Next came Deborah, strongly coloured by the Anthems[45] and Athaliah, his first English Oratorio.[46] In these three oratorios Handel laid foundation for the traditional use of the chorus which marks his later oratorios.[47] Handel became sure of himself, broader in his presentation, and more diverse in his composition.[48]It is evident how much he learnt from Arcangelo Corelli about writing for instruments, and from Alessandro Scarlatti about writing for the solo voice; but there is no single composer who taught him how to write for chorus.[49] Handel tended more and more to replace Italian soloists by English ones. The most significant reason for this change was the dwindling financial returns from his operas.[50] Thus a tradition was created for oratorios which was to govern their future performance. The performances were given without costumes and action; the performers appeared in a black suit.[51]Caricature of Handel by Joseph Goupy (1754)In 1736 Handel produced Alexander's Feast. John Beard appeared for the first time as one of Handel's principal singers and became Handel's permanent tenor soloist for the rest of Handel's life.[52] The piece was a great success and it encouraged Handel to make the transition from writing Italian operas to English choral works. In Saul, Handel was collaborating with Charles Jennens and experimenting with three trombones, a carillon and extra-large military kettledrums (from the Tower of London), to be sure "...it will be most excessive noisy".[53] Saul and Israel in Egypt both from 1739 head the list of great, mature oratorios, in which the da capo and dal segno aria became the exception and not the rule.[54] Israel in Egypt consists of little else but choruses, borrowing from the Funeral Anthem for Queen Caroline. In his next works Handel changed his course. In these works he laid greater stress on the effects of orchestra and soloists; the chorus retired into the background.[55] L'Allegro, il Penseroso ed il Moderato has a rather diverting character; the work is light and fresh.During the summer of 1741, the 3rd Duke of Devonshire invited Handel to Dublin to give concerts for the benefit of local hospitals.[56] His Messiah was first performed at the New Music Hall in Fishamble Street, on 13 April 1742, with 26 boys and five men from the combined choirs of St Patrick's and Christ Church cathedrals participating.[57] Handel secured a balance between soloists and chorus which he never surpassed.The use of English soloists reached its height at the first performance of Samson. The work is highly theatrical. The role of the chorus became increasingly import in his later oratorios. Jephtha was first performed on 26 February 1752; even though it was his last oratorio, it was no less a masterpiece than his earlier works.[58]Later yearsGeorge Frideric Handel in 1733, by Balthasar Denner (1685–1749)In 1749 Handel composed Music for the Royal Fireworks; 12,000 people attended the first performance.[59] In 1750 he arranged a performance of Messiah to benefit the Foundling Hospital. The performance was considered a great success and was followed by annual concerts that continued throughout his life. In recognition of his patronage, Handel was made a governor of the Hospital the day after his initial concert. He bequeathed a copy of Messiah to the institution upon his death.[60] His involvement with the Foundling Hospital is today commemorated with a permanent exhibition in London's Foundling Museum, which also holds the Gerald Coke Handel Collection. In addition to the Foundling Hospital, Handel also gave to a charity that assisted impoverished musicians and their families.In August 1750, on a journey back from Germany to London, Handel was seriously injured in a carriage accident between The Hague and Haarlem in the Netherlands.[61] In 1751 one eye started to fail. The cause was a cataract which was operated on by the great charlatan Chevalier Taylor. This led to uveitis and subsequent loss of vision. He died eight years later in 1759 at home in Brook Street, at age 74. The last performance he attended was of Messiah. Handel was buried in Westminster Abbey.[62] More than three thousand mourners attended his funeral, which was given full state honours.Handel never married, and kept his personal life private. His initial will bequeathed the bulk of his estate to his niece Johanna. However four codicils distributed much of his estate to other relations, servants, friends and charities.[63]Handel owned an art collection that was auctioned posthumously in 1760.[64] The auction catalogue listed approximately seventy paintings and ten prints (other paintings were bequeathed).[64]WorksSenesino, the famous castrato from SienaMain articles: List of compositions by George Frideric Handel and List of operas by Handel.Handel's compositions include 42 operas, 29 oratorios, more than 120 cantatas, trios and duets, numerous arias, chamber music, a large number of ecumenical pieces, odes and serenatas, and 16 organ concerti. His most famous work, the oratorio Messiah with its "Hallelujah" chorus, is among the most popular works in choral music and has become the centrepiece of the Christmas season. Among the works with opus numbers published and popularised in his lifetime are the Organ Concertos Op.4 and Op.7, together with the Opus 3 and Opus 6 concerti grossi; the latter incorporate an earlier organ concerto The Cuckoo and the Nightingale in which birdsong is imitated in the upper registers of the organ. Also notable are his sixteen keyboard suites, especially The Harmonious Blacksmith.Handel introduced previously uncommon musical instruments in his works: the viola d'amore and violetta marina (Orlando), the lute (Ode for St. Cecilia's Day), three trombones (Saul), clarinets or small high cornetts (Tamerlano), theorbo, horn (Water Music), lyrichord, double bassoon, viola da gamba, bell chimes, positive organ, and harp (Giulio Cesare, Alexander's Feast).[65]Handel's works have been catalogued in the Händel-Werke-Verzeichnis and are commonly referred to by an HWV number. For example, Messiah is catalogued as HWV 56.LegacyA Masquerade at the King's Theatre, Haymarket (c. 1724)Handel's works were collected and preserved by two men in particular: Sir Samuel Hellier, a country squire whose musical acquisitions form the nucleus of the Shaw-Hellier Collection,[66] and abolitionist Granville Sharp. The catalogue accompanying the National Portrait Gallery exhibition marking the tercentenary of the composer's birth calls them two men of the late eighteenth century "who have left us solid evidence of the means by which they indulged their enthusiasm".[67]After his death, Handel's Italian operas fell into obscurity, except for selections such as the aria from Serse, "Ombra mai fù". The oratorios continued to be performed but not long after Handel's death they were thought to need some modernisation, and Mozart orchestrated a German version of Messiah and other works. Throughout the 19th century and first half of the 20th century, particularly in the Anglophone countries, his reputation rested primarily on his English oratorios, which were customarily performed by enormous choruses of amateur singers on solemn occasions.Since the Early Music Revival many of the forty-two operas he wrote have been performed in opera houses and concert halls.Handel's music was studied by composers such as Haydn, Mozart and BeethovenRecent decades have revived his secular cantatas and what one might call 'secular oratorios' or 'concert operas'. Of the former, Ode for St. Cecilia's Day (1739) (set to texts by John Dryden) and Ode for the Birthday of Queen Anne (1713) are noteworthy. For his secular oratorios, Handel turned to classical mythology for subjects, producing such works as Acis and Galatea (1719), Hercules (1745) and Semele (1744). These works have a close kinship with the sacred oratorios, particularly in the vocal writing for the English-language texts. They also share the lyrical and dramatic qualities of Handel's Italian operas. As such, they are sometimes performed onstage by small chamber ensembles. With the rediscovery of his theatrical works, Handel, in addition to his renown as instrumentalist, orchestral writer, and melodist, is now perceived as being one of opera's great musical dramatists.A carved marble statue of Handel, created for the Vauxhall Gardens in 1738 by Louis-François Roubiliac, and now preserved in the Victoria & Albert Museum.Handel's work was edited by Samuel Arnold (40 vols., London, 1787–1797), and by Friedrich Chrysander, for the German Händel-Gesellschaft (105 vols., Leipzig, 1858–1902).Handel adopted the spelling "George Frideric Handel" on his naturalisation as a British subject, and this spelling is generally used in English-speaking countries. The original form of his name, Georg Friedrich Händel, is generally used in Germany and elsewhere, but he is known as "Haendel" in France. Another composer with a similar name, Handl or Händl, was an Austrian from Carniola and is more commonly known as Jacobus Gallus.Musician's musicianHandel has generally been accorded high esteem by fellow composers, both in his own time and since.[68] Bach attempted, unsuccessfully, to meet with Handel while he was visiting Halle.[69] Mozart is reputed to have said of him, "Handel understands affect better than any of us. When he chooses, he strikes like a thunder bolt."[70] To Beethoven he was "the master of us all... the greatest composer that ever lived. I would uncover my head and kneel before his tomb".[70] Beethoven emphasised above all the simplicity and popular appeal of Handel's music when he said, "Go to him to learn how to achieve great effects, by such simple means".HomagesHandel Commemoration in Westminster Abbey, 1784After Handel's death, many composers wrote works based on or inspired by his music. The first movement from Louis Spohr's Symphony No. 6, Op. 116, "The Age of Bach and Handel", resembles two melodies from Handel's Messiah. In 1797 Ludwig van Beethoven published the 12 Variations in G major on ‘See the conqu’ring hero comes’ from Judas Maccabaeus by Handel, for cello and piano. Guitar virtuoso Mauro Giuliani composed his Variations on a Theme by Handel, Op. 107 for guitar, based on Handel's Suite No. 5 in E major, HWV 430, for harpsichord. In 1861, using a theme from the second of Handel's harpsichord suites, Johannes Brahms wrote the Variations and Fugue on a Theme by Handel, Op. 24, one of his most successful works (praised by Richard Wagner). Several works by the French composer Félix-Alexandre Guilmant use Handel's themes, for example his March on a Theme by Handel uses a theme from Messiah. French composer and flautist Philippe Gaubert wrote his Petite marche for flute and piano based on the fourth movement of Handel's Trio Sonata, Op. 5, No. 2, HWV 397. Argentine composer Luis Gianneo composed his Variations on a Theme by Handel for piano. In 1911, Australian-born composer and pianist Percy Grainger based one of his most famous works on the final movement of Handel's Suite No. 5 in E major (just like Giuliani). He first wrote some variations on the theme, which he titled Variations on Handel's ‘The Harmonious Blacksmith’ . Then he used the first sixteen bars of his set of variations to create Handel in the Strand, one of his most beloved pieces, of which he made several versions (for example, the piano solo version from 1930). Arnold Schoenberg's Concerto for String Quartet and Orchestra in B flat major (1933) was composed after Handel's Concerto Grosso, Op. 6/7.VenerationHandel is honored together with Johann Sebastian Bach and Henry Purcell with a feast day on the liturgical calendar of the Episcopal Church (USA) on 28 July.He is commemorated as a musician in the Calendar of Saints of the Lutheran Church on 28 July, with Johann Sebastian Bach and Heinrich Schütz.He is commemorated as a musician along with Johann Sebastian Bach on 28 July by The Order of Saint Luke in their calendar of saints prepared for the use of The United Methodist Church.EditionsBetween 1787 and 1797 Samuel Arnold compiled a 180-volume collection of Handel's works—however it was far from complete.[72] Also incomplete was the collection produced between 1843 and 1858 by the English Handel Society (found by Sir George Macfarren).[73]The 105-volume Händel-Gesellschaft edition was published in the mid 19th century and was mainly edited by Friedrich Chrysander (often working alone in his home). For modern performance, the realisation of the basso continuo reflects 19th century practice. Vocal scores drawn from the edition were published by Novello in London, but some scores, such as the vocal score to Samson are incomplete.The still-incomplete Hallische Händel-Ausgabe started to appear in 1956 (named for Halle in Saxony-Anhalt Eastern Germany, not the Netherlands). It did not start as a critical edition, but after heavy criticism of the first volumes, which were performing editions without a critical apparatus (for example, the opera Serse was published with the title character recast as a tenor reflecting pre-war German practice), it repositioned itself as a critical edition. Influenced in part by cold-war realities, editorial work was inconsistent: misprints are found in abundance and editors failed to consult important sources. In 1985 a committee was formed to establish better standards for the edition.From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Back after almost a year with the first part of a two series on the South Sea BUbble. War maybe Hell but it’s also very, expensive and like every other country in 1700 England was deeply in debt.  Enter the South Sea Company and a story that mixes avarice, corruption, deceit, international intrigue and vast sums of other peoples money. Enjoy! Tony

At the beginning of 1720, almost the whole of England thought that investing money in the South Sea Company was an admirable idea; by the end of 1720, they were equally convinced that the company was made up of nothing but rogues and vagabonds. What was the South Sea Bubble and how can we...