Money, banking & finance

Topics represented

Economic Sciences (156) · Nobel laureates (99) · People (99) · Nobel Prizes (57) · Money, banking & finance (28) · British Empire (24) · Companies, trade & extraction (16) · Law & imperial government (9) · War & conquest (7) · Resistance & colonized agency (6) · Colonization & sovereignty (5) · Slavery & coerced labor (5)

Records and sources

Ordered by start date. Long lives and processes may begin before the period you want to study.

1. 1825–1917

   Dadabhai Naoroji

   An intellectual, merchant and leader of the Indian National Congress, Naoroji developed the “drain theory” to explain how Indian revenues and resources flowed to Britain. In 1892 he was elected to the British Parliament, where he connected imperial representation, poverty and self-government. His career between Bombay and London shows nationalism developing through statistics, print, associations and strategic use of metropolitan institutions

2. 1825–1826

   British banking crisis of 1825–1826

   The 1825 crisis exposed the failure of many provincial banks and led the Bank of England to reconsider opening branches; legislative authorization followed in 1826. It is an institutional change arising from a particular crisis, not proof that a branch network by itself eliminates banking or credit risk.

3. 1833–1838

   Abolition of slavery and the end of “apprenticeship”

   The 1833 Act gradually freed most enslaved people in British colonies, excluded Company territories, and paid £20 million to owners rather than the enslaved. The coercive “apprenticeship” system ended in 1838 after sustained protest

4. 1844

   Bank Charter Act and separation of note issue

   The 1844 Bank Charter Act separated the Bank of England’s Issue Department from its banking business and restricted the creation of new note issuers in England and Wales. It formalized an issuance regime and banking privileges within the United Kingdom; it did not immediately turn all financial institutions into central banks or prevent later liquidity crises.

5. 1853–1902

   Cecil Rhodes

   A diamond magnate, Cape Colony prime minister and founder of the British South Africa Company, Rhodes converted mining capital and a corporate charter into territorial expansion toward present-day Zimbabwe and Zambia. His government advanced dispossession and racial segregation, and his backing of the Jameson Raid destabilized the region. Scholarships, monuments and university debates now prolong a contested memory of wealth, violence and imperial supremacy

6. 1855

   The Santal Hul challenges Company rule

   Tens of thousands of Santals mobilized under Sidhu, Kanhu, Chand, and Bhairav Murmu against revenue agents, moneylenders, zamindars, and Company rule. Suppression was devastating—the death toll is uncertain and contested—but the revolt forced administrative reorganization of the Santal Parganas

7. 1865

   Latin Monetary Union and bimetallic coordination

   The 1865 International Monetary Convention coordinated weights, fineness, and circulation of gold and silver coins among France, Belgium, Italy, and Switzerland. It facilitated a monetary area with shared rules, but did not create a fully integrated single currency or resolve the pressures that changing gold–silver relative values placed on bimetallism.

8. 1866

   Overend Gurney failure and the 1866 panic

   Overend Gurney, one of London’s largest discount houses, suspended payment on 10 May 1866. The Bank of England declined to assist the insolvent firm but lent to refinance viable banks and brokers. The episode stimulated debates on liquidity, moral hazard, and last resort; it does not show that every financial rescue follows one rule.

9. 1873

   Bagehot, Lombard Street, and lender of last resort

   In Lombard Street (1873), Walter Bagehot formulated influential principles for lender-of-last-resort lending: lend freely in a panic, at a high rate, and against good security. It was an analytical argument about the Bank of England’s function, not a law or an exact description of every historical intervention, which varied across nineteenth-century crises.

10. 1875

    Britain buys Egypt’s Suez Canal shares

    Benjamin Disraeli’s government bought Khedive Ismail’s shares in the canal company, rapidly financed by Rothschild. The transaction did not make the canal British property, but it deepened strategic and financial stakes in Egypt and the route to India

11. 1876–1878

    Drought and imperial policy magnify the Great Famine

    Monsoon failure and El Niño struck southern and western India while prices, exports, taxation, and restrictive state relief magnified mortality. Estimates vary widely—millions died, but no single total is secure—and the disaster prompted famine codes and nationalist criticism

12. 1882

    Britain occupies Egypt after the ʿUrabi revolt

    Naval intervention and the British victory at Tel el-Kebir defeated Ahmed ʿUrabi’s movement, which demanded limits on foreign control and khedival rule. Egypt remained formally Ottoman but was governed under British occupation, securing debt interests, cotton, and Suez

13. 1888–1895

    Chartered companies turn treaties into African rule

    Charters for the Imperial British East Africa Company and British South Africa Company delegated treaty-making, policing, extraction, and administration to private firms. Their agents obtained concessions of disputed meaning, and the government proclaimed protectorates when company rule proved costly or unstable

14. 1890

    Baring crisis and guarantee fund

    In November 1890, the Bank of England coordinated a guarantee fund for Baring Brothers’ obligations after assessing its solvency and assets. The operation contained a London intermediation crisis connected with foreign debt, but was not a universal public guarantee for all investments or an explanation reducible to one banking family.

15. 1895–1973

    Ragnar Frisch

    Ragnar Frisch (1895–1973) appears in the official census of individual laureates for Economic Sciences (1969). This record represents the person’s life; each award is dated separately, and the prize year does not stand for the date of their whole body of work.

16. 1897

    British forces capture and loot Benin City

    After a British expedition was killed while advancing despite warnings, a punitive force captured Benin City, deposed Oba Ovonramwen, and removed thousands of court objects. Their sale helped finance the operation and dispersed the so-called “Benin Bronzes” through museums and collections worldwide

17. 1898–1987

    Gunnar Myrdal

    Gunnar Myrdal (1898–1987) appears in the official census of individual laureates for Economic Sciences (1974). This record represents the person’s life; each award is dated separately, and the prize year does not stand for the date of their whole body of work.

18. 1899–1902

    The South African War combines guerrilla warfare and concentration camps

    Britain fought the Boer republics in a war over regional power and a mining-centered order. Against guerrillas it used scorched earth and confined Boer and African civilians in segregated camp systems; tens of thousands died, but African records are incomplete and totals require caution

19. 1899–1992

    Friedrich von Hayek

    Friedrich von Hayek (1899–1992) appears in the official census of individual laureates for Economic Sciences (1974). This record represents the person’s life; each award is dated separately, and the prize year does not stand for the date of their whole body of work.

20. 1899–1979

    Bertil Ohlin

    Bertil Ohlin (1899–1979) appears in the official census of individual laureates for Economic Sciences (1977). This record represents the person’s life; each award is dated separately, and the prize year does not stand for the date of their whole body of work.

21. 1901–1985

    Simon Kuznets

    Simon Kuznets (1901–1985) appears in the official census of individual laureates for Economic Sciences (1971). This record represents the person’s life; each award is dated separately, and the prize year does not stand for the date of their whole body of work.

22. 1902–1998

    Theodore W. Schultz

    Theodore W. Schultz (1902–1998) appears in the official census of individual laureates for Economic Sciences (1979). This record represents the person’s life; each award is dated separately, and the prize year does not stand for the date of their whole body of work.

23. 1903–1994

    Jan Tinbergen

    Jan Tinbergen (1903–1994) appears in the official census of individual laureates for Economic Sciences (1969). This record represents the person’s life; each award is dated separately, and the prize year does not stand for the date of their whole body of work.

24. 1904–1989

    John R. Hicks

    John R. Hicks (1904–1989) appears in the official census of individual laureates for Economic Sciences (1972). This record represents the person’s life; each award is dated separately, and the prize year does not stand for the date of their whole body of work.

25. 1906

    Bambatha resists Natal’s poll tax

    Chief Bambatha kaMancinza and Zulu communities rose against a poll tax that pressed African men into the colonial labour market. Natal forces crushed the rebellion and beheaded Bambatha; death totals are approximate and colonial records incomplete

26. 1906–1999

    Wassily Leontief

    Wassily Leontief (1906–1999) appears in the official census of individual laureates for Economic Sciences (1973). This record represents the person’s life; each award is dated separately, and the prize year does not stand for the date of their whole body of work.

27. 1907–1995

    James E. Meade

    James E. Meade (1907–1995) appears in the official census of individual laureates for Economic Sciences (1977). This record represents the person’s life; each award is dated separately, and the prize year does not stand for the date of their whole body of work.

28. 1909

    Moody’s credit information on railroad bonds

    In 1909 John Moody began offering investors credit information and gradations for railroad bonds. This entry records the development of private credit-information intermediaries, not public regulation of agencies or a guarantee that a rating correctly predicts every default.

29. 1910–1985

    Tjalling C. Koopmans

    Tjalling C. Koopmans (1910–1985) appears in the official census of individual laureates for Economic Sciences (1975). This record represents the person’s life; each award is dated separately, and the prize year does not stand for the date of their whole body of work.

30. 1910–2013

    Ronald H. Coase

    Ronald H. Coase (1910–2013) appears in the official census of individual laureates for Economic Sciences (1991). This record represents the person’s life; each award is dated separately, and the prize year does not stand for the date of their whole body of work.