The 1873 financial crisis that began with the collapse of the Vienna stock exchange and helped trigger the Long Depression was the Panic of 1873.
The Vienna stock-market crash occurred in May 1873 after speculative investment in railways, construction, and property had pushed prices to unsustainable levels. The failure of the investment firm Weisse & Karger helped expose the weakness, and panic spread through the Austrian financial system.
The crisis soon reached Germany and the United States. In September 1873, the failure of Jay Cooke & Company, a major U.S. financier of government railroad bonds, contributed to a banking panic. The New York Stock Exchange closed temporarily for the first time in its history, from September 20 to September 29.
The resulting downturn is often called the Long Depression, although historians debate its exact duration and severity. It involved falling prices, bankruptcies, unemployment, and industrial weakness across several countries. It should not be confused with the Panic of 1893, another major U.S. financial crisis.