Posted by on Nov 11, 2017 in Articles & Advice, Blog, Columns, Featured |

Image Credit:  Barrington Bramley, “Isaac Newton” (after Godfrey Kneller, 1689), Wikimedia Commons

 

 

By Jason Zweig |  Nov. 8, 2017 1:43 pm ET

 

Was one of the most immortal scientists in history also one of the world’s most mortal investors?

In a recent column on the effort to predict stock-market behavior with principles from geophysics, I cited the losses — reputed to exceed $3.6 million in today’s money — that Sir Isaac Newton incurred speculating on London’s notorious South Sea bubble in 1720. I also cited the remark, often attributed to Newton, that he “could calculate the motions of the heavenly bodies, but not the madness of the people.”

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To read the rest of the column: 

The Wall Street Journal, http://on.wsj.com/2zHedfy

 

 

 

For further reading:

Reference:

Andrew Odlyzko’s research papers

Books:

Definitions of BEHAVIORAL FINANCE, BUBBLE, CRASH, FORECASTING, IRRATIONAL, OVERCONFIDENCE, PANIC, RISK, TACTICAL ASSET ALLOCATION, in Jason Zweig, The Devil’s Financial Dictionary

Chapter Four, “Prediction,” in Jason Zweig, Your Money and Your Brain

John Carswell, The South Sea Bubble

Richard Dale, The First Crash: Lessons from the South Sea Bubble

Thomas Levenson, Newton and the Counterfeiter: The Unknown Detective Career of the World’s Greatest Scientist

 

 

Articles:

The Extraordinary Popular Delusion of Bubble Spotting

Escaping the Magnetic Pull of a Bubble

The Extraordinary Popular Delusion of Believing What You Read

The Museum of Art and Finance, Gallery 1: Tulipmania

A (Long) Chat with Peter L. Bernstein

A Short History of Folly

Searching for the First ‘Bubble’