Tulip fever in Holland of the 17th century can be considered a scam in the sense that was invested in this word in the century before last, that is, a profitable enterprise. But when the thirst for profit covers literally the entire population of the country, when one product becomes a means of profit, and the mechanisms for making transactions are in no way protected, sooner or later everyone will lose.
Many economists believe that the cause of financial crises is the separation of the sphere of circulation (money) from the sphere of production (goods) due to globalization, growth and complication of global financial flows and the emergence of new banking technologies. For the first time, the threat of such a "separation from the people and a fall" arose at the beginning of the XVII century "in one single country" - Holland, which at that time was one of the most developed economically.
The financial catastrophe was the result of a rush of demand for tulips and the emergence of futures trading. Considering that contract insurance mechanisms were developed only centuries later, it is not surprising that almost the entire population of the country suffered from this "paper trade".
Why was the subject of speculation on a national scale a tulip, and not, say, emeralds or overseas spices and other colonial goods, to which the country of seafarers had almost exclusive access? Perhaps the fact is that at the beginning of the XVII century, a bouquet of tulips in the Dutchman’s drawing room meant roughly the same as today your own yacht or Rolls Royce. The tulip was a status symbol. He testified of belonging to the upper strata of society. It is not surprising that when the tulip bulb was affordable for the average Dutchman, the country was in a fever. Everyone wanted to grab their piece and join the wealth of the tulip market.
But there was another reason why it was the tulip that became the subject of ambitious speculation that ruined one of the most economically developed countries in Europe. Like most other ornamental plants, the tulip came to Europe from the Middle East. He was brought from Turkey in the middle of the XVI century. But the tulip had one interesting feature. Beautiful flowers of a uniform color grew from bulbs, but after a few years it suddenly changed: stripes of various shades appeared on the petals. It is now known that this is the result of a viral disease of tulips. But then it seemed like a miracle. To get rich, the Dutch jeweler had to first pay a lot of money for a diamond, then work for a long time to cut it, and then sell the stone with profit. The owner of a single tulip bulb could instantly become the owner of a new, unique variety that could be sold several times more on the tulip market.
The tulip was good because its striped varieties perfectly matched the needs of the most expensive market segment - such flowers were rare and sold at a very high price, while the bulk of cheap yellow, pink and red tulips met the needs of middle-class buyers.
In 1612, the Florilegium catalog with drawings of 100 varieties of tulips was published in Amsterdam. Many European royal courts became interested in a new symbol of prosperity. Tulips jumped in price. In 1623, a bulb of the rare Semper Augustus variety, which was in great demand, cost 1,000 florins, and at the height of the tulip boom in 1634–1636, up to 4,600 florins paid for it. For comparison: a pig cost 30 florins, a cow about 100.
The third cause of the tulip boom was the plague of 1633-1635. Due to the high mortality, a shortage of workers arose and, accordingly, salaries increased. Ordinary Dutch people got money, and, looking at the tulip madness of the rich, they began to invest it in their own tulip business.
Finally, tulips are seasonal plants. Before the tulip boom, they were traded from May (when they dug flower bulbs) through October (then they were planted, and a tulip bloomed next spring).