Yeah I had never really heard of the other three options and knew that 213.5 was in the general south-southwest area so just went with that.

The correct answer makes sense, but I did not have any way of getting there.

Question 6: History

Which of these corporations reached the greatest level of market capitalization (the value of its stock or other ownership interests) in real terms (i.e., comparable-value dollars or euros or whatever) at its peak?

A. British East India Company

D1iabol1cal (via rand A/B)

B. Dutch East India Company

ibavly
True North

C. South Sea Company

D. Standard Oil


I could have made this one a lot harder (see below), but as it is it seems to have been tough enough as it did split our remaining players.

Let's dispense with Standard Oil (D) first. Of the monopolies of the robber baron, industrial revolution days, John D Rockefeller's Standard Oil was the biggest with a market capitalization that peaked at about $1 trillion in today's dollars. (For comparison, the GNP — roughly, the value of the entire economy — of the United States in 2015 was $18 trillion)

I was a bit disappointed nobody chose the South Sea Company (C). It's not as if I can point to the tremendous scope of the company's operations, since it never actually did anything at all. But the South Sea bubble, as the height of speculation in the Company's fortunes is now known, was one of the world's first and still most impressive examples of investors' enthusiasm (and a fair amount of bad behavior — the whole story is fascinating and I wish I could relate even a tiny fraction of it) overwhelming rationality. This company held a government-issued monopoly on trade between Britain and South America, which sounds pretty big until you realize that at the time, Spain controlled South America and there therefore was no such trade. At all. The company therefore never had any source of income but that didn't stop the pump-and-dump scheme (which involved some high government muckety-mucks), which eventually (albeit briefly — the stock reached a peak of about £1000 a share less than a year after it had been selling at £100 a share) ran the company's valuation up to about $6 trillion in real terms, which was more, by the way, than the total valuation of the entire British economy at the time.

The company lived on in some form for another century but it never really amounted to much and those who'd invested their fortunes, lost them. Oops.

That leaves us with the East India Companies. The largest was the Verenigde Oostindische Compagnie (VOC, hence the logo on the coin pictured above). That's Dutch East India Company (B) to us. Why exactly it was so much larger (by a factor of more than ten) than the British East India Company (A) in peak market capitalization seems to be less because the Dutch company focused on trade or high-value stuff (spices) while the British company got bogged down in governing the Indian subcontinent, and more because of stock speculation — the Dutch company's market peak of about $10 trillion in today's terms was related, in a way I admit I don't fully understand, to the company's stake in the tulip craze, which in turn was another of those classic textbook examples of a market run amok.

Anyway, the answer is B.

I could have made it a ton harder by telling you that the Dutch East India Company was tops and then asking for number two. The answer to that wouldn't have been any of the companies I listed, but rather the Mississippi Company, whose market capitalization peaked about $8 trillion real despite it, like the South Sea Company, never doing anything at all, as it was founded to control trade between France and the Louisiana Territory before there was any such trade. As with South Sea, the fact that i had no source of revenue didn't prevent some people from making a ton of money on it and others from losing exactly as much. Maybe the Tesla phenomenon isn't so remarkable at all.

Caveat emptor, y'all.

Rheingold	(correct)	Walküre	(correct)	Siegfried	(correct)	Götterdämmerung	(correct)
_dave_	1	FCBLComish	0	27ninjabunnies	1	425kid	1
aaronk56	4	fightnwin	2	Aaronk56's Son	3	Brian O'Nolan	1
accobra_kid	1	fnord_too	2	chuckleslovakian	1	D1iabol1cal	5
ArcticKnight	3	ibavly	6	dc-ohio	3	derwipok	2
jedi	0	KrazyKris	3	Gamer Dude	2	eyebooger	3
master3004	4	Montecore	1	lenC	1	Jeremy517	3
Nicholasp27	1	Mor_Tilt4mePls	0	loosekanen	0	kcaw	4
Priptonite	2	NeverObliviate	3	pmarrsouth	1	King_of_NYC	4
rtspurs	1	TehVader	1	rtd353	3	lilrascal	0
toedder	1	Thingyman	2	TehBankertin	0	pwnsall	2
True North	6	vruuuuk	3	TheGunslinger	3	soma84	3
Weatherguy	2	wesrwood	2	xander biscuits	1	TheJubilantMale	4

The sun has set on Götterdämmerung, and we're head to head.

I'm not sure when we'll get Q7 up.

South Sea was the only one I felt comfortable ruling out because I read the wiki a few months back and I think it would have stuck with me if it had a market cap record.

True North,

chop?

Damn, sorry team. I didn't really have any idea but the top 2 just sounded the most "correct".

You'd think I'd be able to get a rand go my way just once in this ****ing game though. Eb must have stolen all the randgood.

I went B totally on the strength of the tulip craze.

I think at it's height the south seas company actually had a market cap of something like 10% of great brittains gdp, despite not actually having any operations or source of income.

Here's a link to the extra history series on it. This was a scam of epic proportions.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=k1kn...JJhy1LyAaDqStr

That's two recent questions that extra history touches on! (The other being the blues and the greens one, they did I think two series on the reign of Justinian and Theodora.)

yeah you can take me out of this

This is the longest I've ever been alive in this game!

Me as well. Nearing two weeks since any game activity.

Bump

I might try to whip together a game of Million POG Dollar Drop^TM for the interim to keep the lynch mob satiated

In

If anybody wants a forum based, multiple choice trivia game right now then here you go: http://forumserver.twoplustwo.com/59...l#post52230776

I'm so sorry, everyone. I know I asked to continue doing this game but life doesn't permit it any more. Anyone who wants to take over, go ahead (and I can forward lists and spreadsheets).

Hey man, no worries. Thanks for doing it as long as you did.

+1 Yeah no worries, and thanks both you and Stuck - was a fun game for a long time

Anyone got any objections if I dust this game off and we run it for a round or two?

I'm in

In fo sho

Very in!

In

Would be in xander. Thanks!

I object. No more games in the POG thread. #letsmakePOGjustpolitics

I don't think anyone has any objections. IMO, take the most recent list of players, PM them all with Question 1 and just add the stipulation "if you don't want to play, just don't reply to this"

also bump the signup again.

Thanks for keeping it alive