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This book discusses theories of monetary and financial innovation and applies them to key monetary and financial innovations in history - starting with the use of silver bars in Mesopotamia and ending with the emergence of the Eurodollar market in London. The key monetary innovations are coinage (Asia minor, China, India), the payment of interest on loans, the bill of exchange and deposit banking (Venice, Antwerp, Amsterdam, London). The main financial innovation is the emergence of bond markets (also starting in Venice). Episodes of innovation are contrasted with relatively stagnant environments (the Persian Empire, the Roman Empire, the Spanish Empire). The comparisons suggest that small, open and competing jurisdictions have been more innovative than large empires - as has been suggested by David Hume in 1742.

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The Political Economy of Monetary and Financial Innovation: Introduction and Overview by PETER BERNHOLZ, ROLAND VAUBEL.- Silver as a Financial Tool in Ancient Egypt and Mesopotamia by MARC VAN DE MIEROOP.- War and Peace, Imitation and Innovation, Backwardness and Development: the Beginnings of Coinage in Ancient Greece and Lydia by DAVID M. SCHAPS.- The Emergence and Spread of Coins in Ancient India by DEME RAJA REDDY.- The Emergence and Spread of Coins in China from the Spring and Autumn Period to the Warring States Period by YOHEI KAKINUMA.- The Changing Pattern of Achaemenid Persian Royal Coinage by CHRISTOPHER TUPLIN.- The Spread of Coins in the Hellenistic World by ANDREW MEADOWS.-Monetary Innovation in Ancient Rome: the Republic and Its legacy by BERNHARD E. WOYTEK.- The Provision of Stable Moneys by Florence and Venice, and North Italian Financial Innovations in the Renaissance Period: the Political Context of Northern Italy from the Twelfth Century Onwards by PETER SPUFFORD.- Monetary and Financial Innovations in Flanders, Antwerp, London and Hamburg: Fifteenth to Eighteenth Century by MARKUS A. DENZEL.- The Bank of Amsterdam Through the Lens of Monetary Competition by STEPHEN QUINN, WILLIAM ROBERDS.- Monetary and Financial Innovation in the Spanish Empire: Lights and Shadows by CARLOS ALVAREZ-NOGAL- The Emergence and Innovations of the Eurodollar Money and Bond Market: the Role of Openness and Competition Between States by TORSTEN SAADMA, ROLAND VAUBEL.

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