Economic History Seminar

Du 18/12/2024 de 12:30 à 14:00

R1-09

NOGUES-MARCO Pilar (Université de Genève)

Trade Imbalances or Silver Arbitrage? Anglo-Asian Bullion Flows in the Early Modern Period, 1664-1813

Silver was the most significant commodity money that connected global exchanges in the early modern period. It was transferred from America toward Asia, with Europe being the major transhipment region. Western scholars of intercontinental trade companies have traditionally interpreted silver flows as the capital balancing item used to settle persistent European trade deficits with Asia caused by the European demand for Asian commodities. Conversely, the California School argues that silver was exchanged for profit as it was cheap in the Western producing regions and expensive in the East because of large China's demand for silver. This view reverses causality because the export of Asian commodities (and gold) to Europe is interpreted as the balancing items used to pay for silver imports to Asia. Data on silver prices are needed to discriminate between the two competing narratives. This research measures the profitability of Euro-Asian arbitrage for silver (and gold) based on original hand-collected data from the East India Company archive in order to define the role of silver in shaping global connections in early modern long-distance trade.