Which exchange saw the 1873 “Black Friday” crash that helped trigger the Long Depression?

The Vienna Stock Exchange saw the 1873 “Black Friday” crash that helped trigger the Long Depression.

The crash occurred on May 9, 1873, in Vienna, then the capital of Austria-Hungary. Speculative investment had surged during an economic expansion, and many companies were created or promoted with unrealistic expectations. When confidence broke, share prices collapsed and a wave of selling overwhelmed the exchange.

The panic spread through financial connections to Germany and other markets. In the United States, the failure of the banking firm Jay Cooke & Company later that year helped turn financial stress into the Panic of 1873, a subject distinct from the Vienna event itself.

The resulting downturn is often called the Long Depression. It involved falling prices, banking failures, industrial weakness, and high unemployment across several countries. Historians debate its exact duration and severity, but the Vienna crash is widely treated as a major opening shock.