The Great Silver Bubble

Inbunden bok. Hodder and Stoughton. 1982. 275 sidor.

Mycket gott skick. Skyddsomslag i gott skick. In London’s Hatton Garden, early in 1980, thousands queued to sell their silver heirlooms: candlesticks and cutlery, coffee pots and silver rings. The price of silver had suddenly gone mad. For decades the poor relation to gold, silver was now the precious metal that seemed to offer a guaranteed hedge against inflation. In less than a year, the price soared — from a few pounds an ounce to over £20 — before collapsing abruptly.

Why did this happen? Who was responsible?

In The Great Silver Bubble, Stephen Fay reveals the answers. Behind the rise in the silver price was an audacious attempt by two of the richest families in the world — the Hunts of Dallas, Texas, and the Al Saud, the royal family of Saudi Arabia — to corner the silver market. Stephen Fay explains how they planned their coup, how they eventually failed, who stopped them, and why it could still happen again.

This is a story of intrigue and speculation, and most of the participants would prefer it were not told. The greatest speculators in the history of the silver market cloaked their machinations in elaborate secrecy — as did the Wall Street and London brokers who handled the accounts. Banks in Europe and elsewhere would rather forget the whole episode. Of course, the best men always prefer to speculate with other people’s money. And during the 1970s, the banks made it remarkably easy for them to do so.