Whether in Chicago, London or Tokyo, the pit is where traders have for centuries met to bargain and make deals in just about anything that can have a price. Meanwhile, the pendulum-like nature of traders’ optimism and pessimism are accompanied by moods oscillating between greed and fear.

In Quest of Aztec Gold: The Panic of 1825

The original idea for this book comes from 30 years’ experience of both trading and analysing financial markets. When performing a detailed statistical analysis on huge volumes of data, there is great virtue in representing data and ideas visually in the most elegant and insightful way.

Armed with cheap banknotes and a romantic disposition, British speculators ventured deep in to the Jungle of Latin American investments during the early 1820s. Yet all they found were profit-sucking leeches and pyramid schemes.