Amsterdam as the cradle of modern futures and options trading ...

507-508) and M. van Tielhof (Hollandse graanhandel, 218) for we believe the moment the Antwerp request
appears in the administration of the Brussels government (February 1557) does not imply it was written at that
time. In our view the documents in the government archives refer to proceedings on the substance of the matter.
42 Graswinckel, Placcaetboeck, 54-65, 71-79
43 C. van Bochove, ‘Haringvisserij in Holland, 1500-1795. Een kwantitatieve analyse’, unpublished MA thesis,
Utrecht University 2003
44 N.W. Posthumus, Nederlandse Prijsgeschiedenis, 2 vols. (Brill: Leiden 1964), Vol I: 85; Vol II: 127-131, 272-
283, 658-659, 766; Cf. also additional prices collected by A.P. van Vliet, Vissers en kapers. De zeevisserij vanuit
het Maasmondgebied en de Duinkerker kapers (ca. 1580-1648) (Stichting Hollande Historische Reeks: ‘s-
Gravenhage 1994), 302-303.
45 To be sure, forward trading was not the only way for fishermen to manage the risk of their operations. Older
strategies included the transfer of both the ownership of herring buses, and the finance of their voyages to
consortia of merchants. H.A.H. Kranenburg, De zeevisscherij van Holland in den tijd der Republiek (H.J. Paris:
Amsterdam 1946), 59-71.
46 On the introduction of quality standards: A. Beaujon, Overzicht der geschiedenis van de Nederlandsche
Zeevisscherijen (Brill: Leiden 1885), 33-47; Kranenburg, Zeevisscherij, 159-160; Sayous ( ‘Spéculation’, 29)
refers to Gerard Malynes’ description of herring options in his Consuetudo vel Lex Mercatoria (first published in
1622). Meanwhile, it should be noted that the proceedings of a legal dispute carried before the local court of
Rotterdam in 1599 mention that the lack of quality standards prevented forward transactions. (Kranenburg,
Zeevisscherij, 152).
47 R. Ehrenberg, Zeitalter der Fugger, Geldkapital und Creditverkehr im 16. Jahrhundert, I, Die Geldmächte des 16.
Jahrhunderts (Fischer: Jena 1896), 69-70. To be sure, merchants had the possibility to ask the local Court
(Schepenbank) to certify the quality of traded (Sayous, ‘Spéculation’, 35). However, given the costs involved in
this kind of legal procedure, it could never serve the lowering of information costs in everyday trade
48 To be sure, the business correspondence of various merchants shows that by the middle of the sixteenth
century, daily prices for a whole range of commodities were set at the Antwerp Exchange. Ehrenberg, Zeitalter,
23, 123, 130-131; Van der Wee, Growth, 330. See also: J.J. McCusker, and C. Gravesteijn, The Beginnings of
Commercial and Financial Journalism (NEHA: Amsterdam 1991)
49 See the collection of ordinances on the trade in life necessities by Graswinckel, Placcaet-boeck, passim
50 Graswinckel, Placcaetboeck, 61, 74, 89
51 Swan, Building the global market 134
52 F.C. Lane, “The Funded Debt of the Venetian Republic, 1262-1482”, in: Braudel, Venice and History, 87-108,
at 87-88; refers to: G. Luzzato, I prestiti della Repubblica di Venezia (sec. xiii-xv) (Padua 1929). A recent
reconstruction, also building on the work of Luzzato: F. Lane and R. Müller, Money and Banking in medieval
and Renaissance Venice. Vol. II. The Venetian money market. Banks, panics, and the public debt, 1200-1500
(John Hopkins: Baltimore 1997)
53 On Genoa: J. Heers, Gênes au XVe sieclè. Activité économique et problèmes sociaux (S.E.V.P.E.N.: Paris
1961), 147-148
54 Lane & Müller, Venetian money market, 456, 464-465; Heers, Gênes, 149
55 Lane & Müller, Venetian money market, 517-518, 555-558,
56 Lane & Müller, Venetian money market, 458n, 476-477; Reinhold Mueller also refers to repeated attempts of
the authorities to try and register what he describes as ‘speculative sales of government obligations on deferred
payment’ (pp. 519-520). However, on the face of it, these transactions may simply imply the buying of bonds on
credit, rather than any kind of forward trading.
57 Lane & Müller, Venetian money market, Mueller, 544-567; After 1450 the debt of the Monte Vecchio was
gradually extinguished and replaced by voluntary loans to the Republic of Venice were made in the form of
deposits in local banks that were not negotiable. See F.C. Lane, “Venetian Bankers, 1496-1533”, in: Braudel,
Venice and History, 69-86, at 82-83
58 On Antwerp: F.J. van den Branden, ed. “De Spaansche muiterij ten Jare 1574”, Antwerpsch Archievenblad
XXII (1885), 133-480; On various towns in Holland: J.D. Tracy, A Financial Revolution in the Habsburg
Netherlands. Renten and Renteniers in the County of Holland, 1515-1565 (Berkeley 1985); and W. Fritschy, ‘A
‘financial revolution’ reconsidered; public finance in Holland during the Dutch Revolt, 1568-1648’, forthcoming
in: Economic History Review (2003)
59 On the limited circle of creditors for Dutch bonds: M. C. ‘t Hart, “Public Loans and Money Lenders”,
Economic and Social History in the Netherlands 1 (1989), 119-139
60 For a detailed analysis of the finance of the first phase of Dutch colonial expansion, see Gelderblom & Jonker,
‘Completing’
61 Van Dillen, ‘Isaac le Maire’; Smith, Tijd-affaires, 42-43; For a reconstruction of speculative trade by other
merchants: Gelderblom & Jonker, ‘Completing’
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