IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/p/fce/doctra/0206.html
   My bibliography  Save this paper

The quality of slave trade investment in eighteenth century France

Author

Listed:
  • Guillaume Daudin

    (OFCE)

Abstract

This paper studies the characteristics of investment in slave trade and associated trades in France during the eighteenth century. The study of the accounts of an investor from Nantes, Bertrand de Cœuvre, shows that his investment compared favourably with domestic alternatives. It was more liquid, shorter and more profitable than private notarized credit without being more risky. It was less risky and had a shorter duration than government debt, without being less liquid or less profitable. The study of investments in a total of 238 ventures from Nantes, Marseilles, Rouen, Bordeaux, La Rochelle and Saint-Malo confirms that superiority from the 1710s to the 1780s. The fact that domestic investors and their capital were attracted to the centres of intercontinental trade investment during the period corroborates this conclusion.

Suggested Citation

  • Guillaume Daudin, 2002. "The quality of slave trade investment in eighteenth century France," Documents de Travail de l'OFCE 2002-06, Observatoire Francais des Conjonctures Economiques (OFCE).
  • Handle: RePEc:fce:doctra:0206
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://www.ofce.sciences-po.fr/pdf/dtravail/wp2002-06.pdf
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Laurence Fontaine, 2001. "Antonio and Shylock: credit and trust in France, c. 1680-c. 1780," Economic History Review, Economic History Society, vol. 54(1), pages 39-57, February.
    2. Anderson, B. L. & Richardson, David, 1983. "Market Structure and Profits of the British African Trade in the Late Eighteenth Century: A Comment," The Journal of Economic History, Cambridge University Press, vol. 43(03), pages 713-721, September.
    3. Guillaume Daudin, 2003. "Do Frontiers give of do frontiers take ? The case of intercontinental trade in France at the end of the Ancien Régime," Documents de Travail de l'OFCE 2003-03, Observatoire Francais des Conjonctures Economiques (OFCE).
    4. Darity, William, 1985. "The Numbers Game and the Profitability of the British Trade in Slaves," The Journal of Economic History, Cambridge University Press, vol. 45(3), pages 693-703, September.
    5. Hoffman, Philip T. & Postel-Vinay, Gilles & Rosenthal, Jean-Laurent, 2001. "Priceless Markets," University of Chicago Press Economics Books, University of Chicago Press, number 9780226348018.
    6. Potter, Mark, 2000. "Good Offices: Intermediation by Corporate Bodies in Early Modern French Public Finance," The Journal of Economic History, Cambridge University Press, vol. 60(3), pages 599-626, September.
    7. Inikori, J. E., 1981. "Market Structure and the Profits of the British African Trade in the Late Eighteenth Century," The Journal of Economic History, Cambridge University Press, vol. 41(4), pages 745-776, December.
    8. Rosenthal Jean-Laurent, 1993. "Credit Markets and Economic Change in Southeastern France 1630-1788," Explorations in Economic History, Elsevier, vol. 30(2), pages 129-157, April.
    9. Darity, William Jr., 1989. "Profitability of the British trade in slaves once again," Explorations in Economic History, Elsevier, vol. 26(3), pages 380-384, July.
    10. Thomas, Robert Paul & Bean, Richard Nelson, 1974. "The Fishers of Men: The Profits of the Slave Trade," The Journal of Economic History, Cambridge University Press, vol. 34(4), pages 885-914, December.
    11. Inikori, J. E., 1983. "Market Structure and the Profits of the British African Trade in the Late Eighteenth Century: A Rejoinder," The Journal of Economic History, Cambridge University Press, vol. 43(03), pages 723-728, September.
    12. Richardson, David, 1987. "The costs of survival: The transport of slaves in the middle passage and the profitability of the 18th-century British slave trade," Explorations in Economic History, Elsevier, vol. 24(2), pages 178-196, April.
    13. Richardson, David, 1989. "Accounting for profits in the British trade in slaves: Reply to William Darity," Explorations in Economic History, Elsevier, vol. 26(4), pages 492-499, October.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Guillaume Daudin, 2003. "Do Frontiers give of do frontiers take ? The case of intercontinental trade in France at the end of the Ancien Régime," Documents de Travail de l'OFCE 2003-03, Observatoire Francais des Conjonctures Economiques (OFCE).

    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. repec:hal:spmain:info:hdl:2441/687 is not listed on IDEAS
    2. repec:spo:wpmain:info:hdl:2441/687 is not listed on IDEAS
    3. Daudin, Guillaume, 2004. "Profitability of Slave and Long-Distance Trading in Context: The Case of Eighteenth-Century France," The Journal of Economic History, Cambridge University Press, vol. 64(1), pages 144-171, March.
    4. repec:spo:wpecon:info:hdl:2441/687 is not listed on IDEAS
    5. repec:hal:wpspec:info:hdl:2441/687 is not listed on IDEAS
    6. repec:spo:wpmain:info:hdl:2441/684 is not listed on IDEAS
    7. repec:hal:spmain:info:hdl:2441/684 is not listed on IDEAS
    8. Jose Miguel Sanjuan‐Marroquin & Martin Rodrigo‐Alharilla, 2024. "‘No commercial activity leaves greater benefit’: The profitability of the Cuban‐based slave trade during the first half of the nineteenth century," Economic History Review, Economic History Society, vol. 77(1), pages 268-287, February.
    9. Guillaume Daudin, 2003. "Do Frontiers give of do frontiers take ? The case of intercontinental trade in France at the end of the Ancien Régime," Documents de Travail de l'OFCE 2003-03, Observatoire Francais des Conjonctures Economiques (OFCE).
    10. Guillaume Daudin, 2006. "Profits du commerce intercontinental et croissance dans la France du xviiie siècle," Revue économique, Presses de Sciences-Po, vol. 57(3), pages 605-613.
    11. Dalton, John T. & Leung, Tin Cheuk, 2015. "Dispersion and distortions in the trans-Atlantic slave trade," Journal of International Economics, Elsevier, vol. 96(2), pages 412-425.
    12. repec:spo:wpecon:info:hdl:2441/684 is not listed on IDEAS
    13. repec:hal:wpspec:info:hdl:2441/684 is not listed on IDEAS
    14. Daron Acemoglu & Simon Johnson & James Robinson, 2005. "The Rise of Europe: Atlantic Trade, Institutional Change, and Economic Growth," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 95(3), pages 546-579, June.
    15. Marcella Lorenzini, 2015. "Notarial Credit in Eighteenth-Century Trentino: Dynamics and Trends," DEM Working Papers 2015/01, Department of Economics and Management.
    16. Timur Kuran & Jared Rubin, 2014. "The Financial Power of the Powerless: Socio-Economic Status and Interest Rates under Partial Rule of Law," Working Papers 14-22, Chapman University, Economic Science Institute.
    17. Peter M. Solar & Klas Rönnbäck, 2015. "Copper sheathing and the British slave trade," Economic History Review, Economic History Society, vol. 68(3), pages 806-829, August.
    18. Jaume Ventura & Hans-Joachim Voth, 2015. "Debt into growth: How sovereign debt accelerated the first Industrial Revolution," Economics Working Papers 1483, Department of Economics and Business, Universitat Pompeu Fabra.
    19. Stephan Heblich & Stephen J. Redding & Hans-Joachim Voth, 2022. "Slavery and the British Industrial Revolution," CEP Discussion Papers dp1884, Centre for Economic Performance, LSE.
    20. Jordà, Òscar & Schularick, Moritz & Taylor, Alan M., 2015. "Leveraged bubbles," Journal of Monetary Economics, Elsevier, vol. 76(S), pages 1-20.
    21. Hoffman, Philip T. & Postel-Vinay, Gilles & Rosenthal, Jean-Laurent, 2015. "Entry, information, and financial development: A century of competition between French banks and notaries," Explorations in Economic History, Elsevier, vol. 55(C), pages 39-57.
    22. repec:spo:wpecon:info:hdl:2441/942 is not listed on IDEAS
    23. Òscar Jordá & Moritz Schularick & Alan M. Taylor, 2016. "Sovereigns Versus Banks: Credit, Crises, and Consequences," Journal of the European Economic Association, European Economic Association, vol. 14(1), pages 45-79.
    24. Temin, Peter & Voth, Hans-Joachim, 2005. "Credit rationing and crowding out during the industrial revolution: evidence from Hoare's Bank, 1702-1862," Explorations in Economic History, Elsevier, vol. 42(3), pages 325-348, July.
    25. Gregory Price & Warren Whatley, 2021. "Did profitable slave trading enable the expansion of empire?: The Asiento de Negros, the South Sea Company and the financial revolution in Great Britain," Cliometrica, Springer;Cliometric Society (Association Francaise de Cliométrie), vol. 15(3), pages 675-718, September.
    26. repec:spo:wpecon:info:hdl:2441/692 is not listed on IDEAS
    27. Jan Luiten van Zanden & Jaco Zuijderduijn & Tine De Moor, 2012. "Small is beautiful: the efficiency of credit markets in the late medieval Holland," European Review of Economic History, European Historical Economics Society, vol. 16(1), pages 3-22, February.
    28. Guillaume Daudin, 2006. "Paying Transaction Costs," Documents de Travail de l'OFCE 2006-14, Observatoire Francais des Conjonctures Economiques (OFCE).
    29. Kevin H. O'Rourke, Leandro Prados de la Escosura and Guilllaume Daudin, 2008. "Trade and Empire, 1700-1870," The Institute for International Integration Studies Discussion Paper Series iiisdp249, IIIS.
    30. repec:hal:spmain:info:hdl:2441/942 is not listed on IDEAS
    31. B. Zorina Khan, 2015. "Invisible Women: Entrepreneurship, Innovation and Family Firms in France during Early Industrialization," NBER Working Papers 20854, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.

    More about this item

    Keywords

    Profits; Slave trade; France; 18th century; international trade;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • F1 - International Economics - - Trade
    • N7 - Economic History - - Economic History: Transport, International and Domestic Trade, Energy, and Other Services
    • N8 - Economic History - - Micro-Business History

    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:fce:doctra:0206. 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: Francesco Saraceno (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://edirc.repec.org/data/ofcspfr.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.