“A Direct Personal Stake”: Mass Investment and the New York Stock Exchange

Rob Aitken

Chapter Chapter 4 in Performing Capital, 2007, pp 113-139 from Palgrave Macmillan

Abstract: Abstract Beginning in the immediate postwar moment and extending until the 1960s, the New York Stock Exchange (NYSE)—an institution at the very center of Anglo-American financial cultures—developed and distributed a booklet for working-class Americans that actually made stock recommendations. Contradicting its self-image as a neutral and unbiased financial marketplace, the NYSE developed a list of “conservative” stocks particularly suited for the “uninitiated.” By recommending a range of stocks that would be particularly suited to working-class investors who had little knowledge of the financial world, the NYSE launched itself into an entirely new field in which it sought not only the exchange but also the promotion of corporate securities. This departure is striking less as an attempt to promote the interests of particular corporate clients, than as a signal of a broader project—often urgently pursued—that centered around the goal of “mass investment.”

Keywords: Economic Life; Productive Capital; Share Ownership; Postwar Period; Intimate Association (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2007
References: Add references at CitEc
Citations:

There are no downloads for this item, see the EconPapers FAQ for hints about obtaining it.

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:pal:palchp:978-0-230-60708-8_5

Ordering information: This item can be ordered from
http://www.palgrave.com/9780230607088

DOI: 10.1057/9780230607088_5

Access Statistics for this chapter

More chapters in Palgrave Macmillan Books from Palgrave Macmillan
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Sonal Shukla () and Springer Nature Abstracting and Indexing ().