What moved share prices in the nineteenth-century London stock market?

Gareth Campbell (), William Quinn, John Turner () and Qing Ye

No 15-06, QUCEH Working Paper Series from Queen's University Belfast, Queen's University Centre for Economic History

Abstract: Using a new weekly blue-chip index, this paper investigates the causes of stock price movements on the London market between 1823 and 1870. We find that economic fundamentals explain about 15 per cent of weekly and 34 per cent of monthly variation in share prices. Contemporary press reporting from the London Stock Exchange is used to ascertain what market participants thought were causing the largest movements on the market. The vast majority of large movements were attributed by the press to geopolitical, monetary, railway-sector, and financial-crisis news. Investigating the stock price changes on an independent list of events reaffirms these findings, suggesting that the most important specific events which moved markets were wars involving European powers.

Keywords: British financial history; financial markets; share price movements (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: N20 N23 N43 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2015
New Economics Papers: this item is included in nep-his
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Citations: View citations in EconPapers (6)

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Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:zbw:qucehw:1506

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