The 1907 U.S. financial panic was called the Panic of 1907, after a failed attempt to corner United Copper shares helped trigger a banking run.
Speculator F. Augustus Heinze and his associates tried to force the price of United Copper upward, expecting to profit from short sellers. The plan failed, United Copper’s price collapsed, and depositors rushed to withdraw money from institutions connected to the scheme.
The panic spread through trust companies and financial markets. J. P. Morgan organized private support to stabilize key institutions and persuade banks to cooperate, demonstrating how dependent the system was on a single private financier.
The crisis helped build support for a central bank. In 1913, the Federal Reserve System was created, partly to provide a more systematic lender of last resort and reduce reliance on emergency private rescues.