China stocks

My article in the August issue of Research magazine is on the history of China's stock market: "Reawakening the Dragon." Excerpt:

In 1978, with Chairman Mao dead and hard-line Maoists in political eclipse, China began experimenting with economic reforms. Stock trading did not immediately appear on the agenda, as early reforms focused on more basic matters such as allowing farmers to sell crops grown on household plots rather than collective land. By the mid-1980s, though, some state-owned companies were edging toward making equity offerings.

A milestone was reached in November 1984 when the Shanghai Feile Acoustics Company issued shares. Soon, over-the-counter share trading was under way in a room at the Shanghai Trust Company. In 1986, John Phelan, chairman of the New York Stock Exchange, visited this nascent operation and pointed out that his sprawling institution had begun without even so much as a room, under a Wall Street buttonwood tree in 1792.

Whole thing here. More financial history articles here. More blogging to come.