You can read an interesting article here on the £1m and £100m banknotes created by the Bank of England. In an earlier post, I explained how these 'giants' and 'titans' form the backing assets for Northern Irish and Scottish banknotes. Notably, the US flirted with the idea of a $1 trillion dollar platinum coin to help the Obama administration circumvent its debt-ceiling commitment. Click here to read more.
My colleague and former PhD student Gareth Campbell has created a website about the British Railway Mania - click here . This episode has been described by the Economist as probably the greatest bubble in human history. Gareth's website provides background on the Mania and posits some explanations for the 'bubble'. In his explanation of why the bubble happened, Gareth places a lot of emphasis on investor myopia regarding future dividends and uncalled capital. His study of investors during the episode does not support the view that this episode was fuelled by naive and irrational investors.