Episodes

  • The South Sea Bubble: Britain's First Great Crash — Even Newton Lost a Fortune | Sleepy Stock Market
    Mar 27 2026

    Fall asleep to the extraordinary story of the South Sea Bubble of 1720 — the financial catastrophe that shook Britain to its foundations, wiped out thousands of investors, and humbled even the greatest mind in history.The South Sea Company made an audacious promise: it would take on Britain's entire national debt in exchange for a monopoly on trade. Shares went into a frenzy. Noblemen, clergymen, servants and speculators piled in. Even Isaac Newton — the man who had calculated the orbits of the planets — lost a fortune. Then it all collapsed in a matter of weeks.This is the story of Britain's first great financial crash, the original bubble that defined every mania that came after it.🎧 Best listened to with headphones or a sleep speaker at low volume.⏱ Designed for long, relaxed listening — no ads, no hype, just the story.━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━SLEEPY STOCK MARKETFall asleep to the greatest stories in financial history.━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━#SouthSeaBubble #IsaacNewton #BritishHistory #FinancialHistory #MarketCrash #StockMarketHistory #SleepStories #FallAsleep #SleepyStockMarket #RobertWalpole #1720 #FinancialBubble #EarlyModernHistory #InvestingHistory #marketbubble 0:00 The Morning That Changed England10:00 War, Debt & Desperate Measures20:00 Birth of the South Sea Company31:40 The King's Endorsement41:40 1720: When Greed Took Over51:40 John Blunt's Dangerous Genius1:01:40 A Nation Goes Gambling Mad1:10:00 The Peak & The Unraveling1:19:10 Panic in Exchange Alley1:28:20 The Reckoning: Who Paid the Price1:41:40 Echoes Across the Centuries

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    1 hr and 48 mins
  • The Bicycle Bubble: When Victorian Britain Lost Its Mind Over Bikes | Sleepy Stock Market
    Mar 20 2026

    Fall asleep to the extraordinary story of the Great British Bicycle Bubble of the 1890s — the moment Victorian Britain went completely mad for cycling stocks, and one of the most forgotten financial manias in history.In the mid-1890s, the bicycle was the internet of its day. Hundreds of companies floated on the London Stock Exchange almost overnight. Fortunes were made, promoters grew fabulously rich, ordinary investors piled in — and then it all collapsed. Ernest Terah Hooley, the era's most flamboyant company promoter, made and lost millions in the frenzy.This is the story of Britain's first tech bubble — decades before Silicon Valley was even a dream.🎧 Best listened to with headphones or a sleep speaker at low volume.⏱ Designed for long, relaxed listening — no ads, no hype, just the story.━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━SLEEPY STOCK MARKETFall asleep to the greatest stories in financial history.━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━#BicycleBubble #VictorianHistory #StockMarketHistory #FinancialHistory #MarketBubble #ErnestHooley #SleepStories #FallAsleep #SleepyStockMarket #InvestingHistory #BritishHistory #VictorianBritain #MarketCrash #financialbubble 0:00 The Streets of Victorian London8:00 The Tyranny of Horse & Rail17:00 Starley & the Rover Revolution28:00 Innovation Ignites a Nation38:00 Freedom on Two Wheels48:00 The Midlands Boom Begins57:00 Enter Ernest Hooley1:07:00 The Bubble Inflates1:17:00 Mania at Its Peak1:25:00 The Crash & Its Aftermath1:32:00 Lessons from the Mania

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    1 hr and 35 mins