IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/p/zbw/qucehw/331898.html
   My bibliography  Save this paper

Remote investing in Latin America, 1869-1929

Author

Listed:
  • Campbell, Gareth
  • Gallagher, Áine
  • Grossman, Richard S.

Abstract

Substantial amounts of British capital flowed to Latin America during the first era of globalisation. Companies financed by this capital were typically headquartered in the UK, but operated thousands of miles away. This paper asks how this geographic separation between governance and business activities affected the valuation of these firms. We find that the location of the headquarters played a more important role than the location of operations. Stock prices tended to fluctuate in line with other equities based in the UK, suggesting that they were still regarded as being, at least partially, British companies.

Suggested Citation

  • Campbell, Gareth & Gallagher, Áine & Grossman, Richard S., 2025. "Remote investing in Latin America, 1869-1929," QUCEH Working Paper Series 25-09, Queen's University Belfast, Queen's University Centre for Economic History.
    • Handle: RePEc:zbw:qucehw:331898
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://www.econstor.eu/bitstream/10419/331898/1/194203671X.pdf
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Pukthuanthong, Kuntara & Roll, Richard, 2009. "Global market integration: An alternative measure and its application," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 94(2), pages 214-232, November.
    2. Goetzmann, William N. & Jorion, Philippe, 1999. "Re-Emerging Markets," Journal of Financial and Quantitative Analysis, Cambridge University Press, vol. 34(1), pages 1-32, March.
    3. Stulz, Rene M. & Williamson, Rohan, 2003. "Culture, openness, and finance," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 70(3), pages 313-349, December.
    4. Mitchener, Kris James & Weidenmier, Marc D., 2008. "The Baring Crisis and the Great Latin American Meltdown of the 1890s," The Journal of Economic History, Cambridge University Press, vol. 68(2), pages 462-500, June.
    5. Gaston Diaz, 2017. "Railway investment in Uruguay before 1914: profitability, subsidies, and economic impact," European Review of Economic History, European Historical Economics Society, vol. 21(3), pages 280-301.
    6. Fabio Braggion & Lyndon Moore, 2011. "Dividend Policies in an Unregulated Market: The London Stock Exchange, 1895--1905," The Review of Financial Studies, Society for Financial Studies, vol. 24(9), pages 2935-2973.
    7. Graeme G Acheson & Gareth Campbell & John D Turner, 2019. "Private Contracting, Law and Finance," The Review of Financial Studies, Society for Financial Studies, vol. 32(11), pages 4156-4195.
    8. Olivier Accominotti & Marc Flandreau & Riad Rezzik, 2011. "The spread of empire: Clio and the measurement of colonial borrowing costs," Economic History Review, Economic History Society, vol. 64(2), pages 385-407, May.
    9. Flores, Juan H., 2011. "Information asymmetries and conflict of interest during the Baring crisis, 1880–18901," Financial History Review, Cambridge University Press, vol. 18(2), pages 191-215, August.
    10. Janette Rutterford & Dimitris P. Sotiropoulos, 2016. "Financial diversification before modern portfolio theory: UK financial advice documents in the late nineteenth and the beginning of the twentieth century," The European Journal of the History of Economic Thought, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 23(6), pages 919-945, November.
    11. William N. Goetzmann & Andrey D. Ukhov, 2006. "British Investment Overseas 1870-1913: A Modern Portfolio Theory Approach," Review of Finance, European Finance Association, vol. 10(2), pages 261-300.
    12. Brian Mitchell & David Chambers & Nick Crafts, 2011. "How good was the profitability of British railways, 1870–1912?," Economic History Review, Economic History Society, vol. 64(3), pages 798-831, August.
    13. Gareth Campbell & John D. Turner, 2011. "Substitutes for legal protection: corporate governance and dividends in Victorian Britain," Economic History Review, Economic History Society, vol. 64(2), pages 571-597, May.
    14. Dimitris P. Sotiropoulos & Janette Rutterford, 2019. "Financial diversification strategies before World War I: Buy-and-hold versus naïve portfolio selection," Business History, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 61(7), pages 1175-1198, October.
    15. Gareth Campbell & Meeghan Rogers, 2017. "Integration between the London and New York Stock Exchanges, 1825–1925," Economic History Review, Economic History Society, vol. 70(4), pages 1185-1218, November.
    16. Blass, Asher & Yafeh, Yishay, 2001. "Vagabond shoes longing to stray: Why foreign firms list in the United States," Journal of Banking & Finance, Elsevier, vol. 25(3), pages 555-572, March.
    17. Graeme G. Acheson & John D. Turner, 2011. "Investor behaviour in a nascent capital market: Scottish bank shareholders in the nineteenth century," Economic History Review, Economic History Society, vol. 64(1), pages 188-213, February.
    18. Flandreau, Marc & Flores, Juan H., 2009. "Bonds and Brands: Foundations of Sovereign Debt Markets, 1820–1830," The Journal of Economic History, Cambridge University Press, vol. 69(3), pages 646-684, September.
    19. Ryland Thomas & Sally Hills & Nicholas Dimsdale, 2010. "The UK recession in context — what do three centuries of data tell us?," Bank of England Quarterly Bulletin, Bank of England, vol. 50(4), pages 277-291.
    20. Triner, Gail D. & Wandschneider, Kirsten, 2005. "The Baring Crisis and the Brazilian Encilhamento, 1889 1891: An Early Example of Contagion Among Emerging Capital Markets," Financial History Review, Cambridge University Press, vol. 12(02), pages 199-225, October.
    21. John D. Turner & Qing Ye & Wenwen Zhan, 2013. "Why Do Firms Pay Dividends?: Evidence from an Early and Unregulated Capital Market," Review of Finance, European Finance Association, vol. 17(5), pages 1787-1826.
    22. Ferguson, Niall & Schularick, Moritz, 2006. "The Empire Effect: The Determinants of Country Risk in the First Age of Globalization, 1880–1913," The Journal of Economic History, Cambridge University Press, vol. 66(2), pages 283-312, June.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Gareth Campbell & Áine Gallagher & Richard S.Grossman, 2025. "Remote Investing in Latin America, 1869-1929," Wesleyan Economics Working Papers 2025-010, Wesleyan University, Department of Economics.
    2. repec:ces:ceswps:_11562 is not listed on IDEAS
    3. Gareth Campbell & Áine Gallagher & Richard S.Grossman, 2024. "Living La Vida Loca? Remote Investing in Latin America, 1869-1929," Wesleyan Economics Working Papers 2024-013, Wesleyan University, Department of Economics.
    4. Turner, John D., 2024. "Three centuries of corporate governance in the UK," QUCEH Working Paper Series 24-01, Queen's University Belfast, Queen's University Centre for Economic History.
    5. Richard S.Grossman, 2017. "Beresford’s Revenge: British equity holdings in Latin America, 1869-1929," Wesleyan Economics Working Papers 2017-003, Wesleyan University, Department of Economics.
    6. Turner, John D., 2014. "Financial history and financial economics," QUCEH Working Paper Series 14-03, Queen's University Belfast, Queen's University Centre for Economic History.
    7. Grossman, Richard, 2017. "Beresford’s Revenge: British equity holdings in Latin America, 1869-1929," CEPR Discussion Papers 12042, C.E.P.R. Discussion Papers.
    8. Graeme G. Acheson & Gareth Campbell & John D. Turner, 2017. "Who financed the expansion of the equity market? Shareholder clienteles in Victorian Britain," Business History, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 59(4), pages 607-637, May.
    9. Kim Oosterlinck, 2013. "Sovereign debt defaults: insights from history," Oxford Review of Economic Policy, Oxford University Press and Oxford Review of Economic Policy Limited, vol. 29(4), pages 697-714, WINTER.
    10. Marc Deloof & Ine Paeleman, 2024. "International entrepreneurship without investor protection: Evidence from initial public offerings in Belgium before the First World War," Economic History Review, Economic History Society, vol. 77(2), pages 523-553, May.
    11. Matthieu Chavaz & Marc Flandreau, 2015. "‘High and dry’: the liquidity and credit of colonial and foreign government debt in the London Stock Exchange (1880–1910)," Bank of England working papers 555, Bank of England.
    12. Gareth Campbell & Meeghan Rogers, 2017. "Integration between the London and New York Stock Exchanges, 1825–1925," Economic History Review, Economic History Society, vol. 70(4), pages 1185-1218, November.
    13. Flandreau, Marc & Chavaz, Matthieu, 2016. "“High & Dry†: The Liquidity and Credit of Colonial and Foreign Government Debt and the London Stock Exchange (1880-1910)," CEPR Discussion Papers 11679, C.E.P.R. Discussion Papers.
    14. Acheson, Graeme G. & Campbell, Gareth & Gallagher, Áine & Turner, John D., 2018. "Independent women: Shareholders in the age of the suffragettes," QUCEH Working Paper Series 2018-09, Queen's University Belfast, Queen's University Centre for Economic History.
    15. Acheson, Graeme G. & Campbell, Gareth & Turner, John D., 2016. "Common law and the origin of shareholder protection," QUCEH Working Paper Series 2016-04, Queen's University Belfast, Queen's University Centre for Economic History.
    16. Tunçer, Ali Coşkun & Weller, Leonardo, 2022. "Democracy, autocracy, and sovereign debt: How polity influenced country risk on the peripheries of the global economy, 1870–1913," Explorations in Economic History, Elsevier, vol. 85(C).
    17. David A Bogle & Christopher Coyle & John D Turner, 2022. "Capital market development over the long run: the portfolios of UK life assurers over two centuries [Corporate ownership and control in Victorian Britain]," European Review of Economic History, European Historical Economics Society, vol. 26(3), pages 370-398.
    18. Graeme G Acheson & Gareth Campbell & John D Turner, 2019. "Private Contracting, Law and Finance," The Review of Financial Studies, Society for Financial Studies, vol. 32(11), pages 4156-4195.
    19. Maxime MERLI & Antoine PARENT, 2022. "Portfolio Diversification During the Belle Époque: When the Actual Portfolios of French Individual Investors Met Behavioral Finance," Working Papers of LaRGE Research Center 2022-01, Laboratoire de Recherche en Gestion et Economie (LaRGE), Université de Strasbourg.
    20. Richard S. Grossman, 2015. "Bloody foreigners! Overseas equity on the London Stock Exchange, 1869–1929," Economic History Review, Economic History Society, vol. 68(2), pages 471-521, May.
    21. Emilie Bonhoure, 2021. "An Original Solution to Agency Issues Among PreWWI Paris-Listed Firms : The Statutory Rule of Profit Allocation," PSE Working Papers halshs-03107869, HAL.

    More about this item

    Keywords

    ;
    ;
    ;
    ;

    JEL classification:

    • F21 - International Economics - - International Factor Movements and International Business - - - International Investment; Long-Term Capital Movements
    • F54 - International Economics - - International Relations, National Security, and International Political Economy - - - Colonialism; Imperialism; Postcolonialism
    • F65 - International Economics - - Economic Impacts of Globalization - - - Finance
    • G11 - Financial Economics - - General Financial Markets - - - Portfolio Choice; Investment Decisions
    • G12 - Financial Economics - - General Financial Markets - - - Asset Pricing; Trading Volume; Bond Interest Rates
    • G15 - Financial Economics - - General Financial Markets - - - International Financial Markets
    • G51 - Financial Economics - - Household Finance - - - Household Savings, Borrowing, Debt, and Wealth
    • N16 - Economic History - - Macroeconomics and Monetary Economics; Industrial Structure; Growth; Fluctuations - - - Latin America; Caribbean
    • N26 - Economic History - - Financial Markets and Institutions - - - Latin America; Caribbean

    NEP fields

    This paper has been announced in the following NEP Reports:

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:zbw:qucehw:331898. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: ZBW - Leibniz Information Centre for Economics (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://edirc.repec.org/data/chqubuk.html .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.