Dutch East India Company: Paid Dividends in Spices?

In 17th-century Amsterdam, almost anyone could buy a share of the Dutch East India Company, from a housemaid with 100 guilders to the richest merchant in town, and the first dividend was paid in spices. This is how the Dutch East India Company actually made its money, and why anyone could buy a piece of the company, but almost no one could tell it what to do. Told from the investor's chair, this documentary follows the VOC from the summer of 1602 to its quiet end in 1799: a shareholder who bet against it, the birth of the first stock market in Amsterdam, the brutal fight for the spice trade in the Banda Islands, the years it was called the richest company in history, and the debts that finished it. Watch next: The Medici Bank: The Rise and Fall of a Financial Empire —    • The Medici Bank: The Rise and Fall of a Fi...   Full playlist: Dynasties & Trading Empires —    • Dynasties & Trading Empires | Business His...   Chapters: 00:00 The Oldest Share Receipt 00:48 A Maid's Hundred Guilders 03:34 Pieter Pays in Installments 06:05 The Man Who Bet Against It 08:43 Paid in Mace 10:50 The First Stock Market & Cape Horn 12:16 The Price of Nutmeg 14:33 Coen's Legacy & the 1622 Revolt 16:31 The Height of the Company 18:55 The Long Leak If you like history that follows the money all the way to the people who paid for it, subscribe and take a seat for the next story. Narration uses an AI-assisted voice. Illustrations are AI-generated reconstructions, not archival photographs. Background music is AI-generated. #economichistory #dutcheastindiacompany #voc #dutchhistory #stockmarkethistory #spicetrade