Wim, a professor of history at Leiden University in the Netherlands? Vandenberg:
Yes, you can say that. This is the first joint-stock company. In order to raise funds, they issue stocks, but not in the modern sense. People come to the company's office and write down the money they lent in their notebooks. The company promises to pay dividends to these stocks. This is how the Dutch East India Company raised funds.
Lodwick Wagenaar, curator of Amsterdam Museum of History, Netherlands:
They collected 6.5 million yuan, which is almost equivalent to 3 million euros. At that time, the money was worth billions, and they set up a company with it.
By financing the whole society, the East India Company successfully transformed its scattered wealth into its own capital for external expansion. Even the maid of the mayor of Amsterdam became one of the shareholders of the East India Company. Thousands of people are willing to invest their savings in this lucrative and risky business activity, on the one hand, out of the desire for wealth, and more importantly, because the Dutch government is also one of the shareholders of the East India Company. The government converted some rights only owned by the state into 25,000 Dutch guilders, which greatly increased the authority and credibility of the East India Company.
Wim Vandendel, Professor of History Department, Leiden University, Netherlands;
The privilege granted by the government to the East India Company is that it can negotiate and sign treaties and wage wars, so that it can become an independent sovereign entity in Asia or the whole region from South Africa to Japan and can operate like a country.
After everything was ready, the fleet of the East India Company set sail. The king of Spain almost despised the overreaching challenger. However, in just five years after the establishment of the East India Company, 50 merchant fleets were sent overseas every year, exceeding the combined fleet of Spain and Portugal.
Lodwick Wagenaar, curator of Amsterdam Museum of History, Netherlands:
In the first ten years, they (East India Company) didn't pay any interest, because investors liked to invest their money in shipbuilding, building houses and establishing a trading kingdom in Asia. After these, ten years later, the company paid dividends to shareholders for the first time.
No dividend has been paid to shareholders for ten consecutive years. Why can such an operation mode be recognized by investors?
This is because the Dutch also created a new capital circulation system. 1609, the first stock exchange in the world history was born in Amsterdam. Shareholders of the East India Company can convert their shares into cash at any time through the stock exchange if they wish.
More than 400 years ago, the Amsterdam Stock Exchange had more than 65,438+0,000 stockbrokers active in the market. Although I haven't put on a red vest yet, fixed trading seats have appeared.
It became the most active capital market in Europe at that time, and not only the Dutch, but also many foreigners came to engage in stock trading. A large amount of dividend income flows into the Dutch treasury and the pockets of ordinary Dutch people from this yard with an area of no more than 1 000 square meters. British bonds alone can earn more than 25 million guilders a year, equivalent to 200 tons of silver.
America is the birthplace of the futures market. 1848, 82 businessmen initiated and organized the Chicago Board of Trade, the main purpose of which was to improve transportation and storage conditions and provide information for members. It was the embryonic form of modern futures trading. 1865, the exchange launched the first standardized contract, and at the same time implemented the margin system (not exceeding 10% of the contract value), which was a historic institutional innovation; 1882, the exchange allows hedging to be exempted from performance responsibility, which increases the liquidity of futures trading. This also makes futures trading
The system is further improved.
The development of the international futures market has gone through the process from commodity futures to financial futures, with the increasing variety and scale of transactions. Commodity futures mainly include agricultural products futures, metal futures and energy futures. Agricultural futures include cash crops such as cotton, coffee and cocoa in addition to wheat, corn and soybeans.
The earliest metal futures trading was born in Britain. The London Metal Exchange, founded in 1876, pioneered metal futures trading, among which copper is the most famous and is still a barometer of the international non-ferrous metal market.
Since 1970s, the variety structure of futures trading has changed greatly, and financial futures have developed rapidly. Futures option trading appears and develops rapidly. On June 1 982 65438+1October1,the American long-term treasury bond futures option contract was listed on the Chicago Stock Exchange, which triggered another revolution in futures trading. At present, most futures trading products in the international futures market have introduced option trading methods.
At present, the basic situation of the international futures market is that commodity futures remain relatively stable, financial futures come from behind, and futures options are in the ascendant.