The 1907 U.S. financial crisis was commonly called the Panic of 1907.
The panic began after an unsuccessful attempt to corner the stock of United Copper Company. When the scheme failed, depositors rushed to withdraw funds from linked banks and trust companies. The crisis intensified in October as confidence weakened and institutions struggled to obtain cash.
J. P. Morgan helped organize private-sector support, persuading bankers to provide liquidity and arranging rescues for vulnerable institutions. The episode demonstrated how dependent the United States was on a small group of private financiers because it had no central bank at the time.
The Panic of 1907 helped create political support for monetary reform. The Aldrich–Vreeland Act of 1908 established emergency currency provisions, and the National Monetary Commission studied banking systems abroad. Those developments contributed to the Federal Reserve Act of 1913 and the creation of the Federal Reserve System. The panic is sometimes confused with the later 1929 Wall Street Crash, but it was a separate crisis sixteen years earlier.