The Dutch developed many of the techniques of modern finance.
"Many individuals grew suddenly rich. A golden bait hung temptingly out before the people, and, one after the other, they rushed to the tulip marts, like flies around a honey-pot. Every one imagined that the passion for tulips would last for ever, and that the wealthy from every part of the world would send to Holland, and pay whatever prices were asked for them. The riches of Europe would be concentrated on the shores of the Zuyder Zee, and poverty banished from the favoured clime of Holland. Nobles, citizens, farmers, mechanics, seamen, footmen, maidservants, even chimney sweeps and old clotheswomen, dabbled in tulips."
Memoirs of Extraordinary Popular Delusions and the Madness of Crowds, Charles Mackay (1841)
"Among the many companies to go public in 1720 is—famously—one that advertised itself as 'a company for carrying out an undertaking of great advantage, but nobody to know what it is'".
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