The Secret of Foam

Author: Peter Gaber
Publisher:
Publish Date: 2003-08-01
Features: Secrets of the Bubble offers an extremely thorough and well-considered examination of the legendary history of early investment bubbles. We often hear discussions about these bubbles in popular literature, but there is almost no genuine insight in this information. Gaber points out that these three speculative price movements in history are far more cunning than commonly recognized. The importance of reading this book now lies in how our past understanding of these bubbles has influenced our perception of today's markets. The book tells the stories of three notorious bubbles—the Tulip Mania, the Mississippi Bubble, and the South Sea Bubble—all of which are seen as examples of the madness of private capital markets. The authorities who study these three famous early bubbles are usually journalists, policymakers, and economists, who emphasize that market turbulence is irrational and unpredictable. The fundamentals of these events are rarely mentioned. In this book, Professor Gaber confirms their fundamentals and reveals that these periods were indeed bubbles. Therefore, the stories of these bubbles are not cautionary tales—the stock market's every speculative surge predicts a crash.