Which exchange’s crash on 9 May 1873 helped begin the Long Depression in Europe and the United States?

The Vienna Stock Exchange crash on 9 May 1873 helped begin the Long Depression in Europe and the United States.

The Vienna market collapsed on 9 May 1873, a day remembered in German-speaking Europe as Gründerkrach, or Founders’ Crash. Speculative investment had surged during an economic boom, especially in railway and property companies. When confidence broke, share prices fell rapidly and many financial firms failed.

The shock spread through European financial markets and soon reached the United States. In America, the failure of the investment banking firm Jay Cooke & Company in September 1873 helped trigger a banking panic and the temporary closure of the New York Stock Exchange.

The downturn became known as the Long Depression. Its length and severity are debated by historians, but it involved prolonged deflation, bankruptcies and unemployment across several industrial economies. It is distinct from the Panic of 1837 and the later Wall Street Crash of 1929.