The Great Copper Crash: How Sweden's Wealth Nearly Destroyed It

In 1624, Gustav II Adolf issued a copper coin so heavy that a ten-daler plate weighed nearly twenty kilograms. It was a radical experiment in state finance, born of wartime desperation and a mining boom in the far north. But within decades, the copper market collapsed, inflation spiraled, and Sweden's economy nearly drowned in its own metal. In this episode, Lucas and Luna trace the rise and fall of Sweden's copper standard — from the tunnels of Falun to the counting houses of Amsterdam — and ask why the very resource that built an empire almost tore it apart. They explore the strange world of plate money, the battle over monetary policy between king and Riksdag, and the lasting scars left on Sweden's economy and national identity. It's a story of boom, bust, and the hard lessons that shaped modern Swedish finance.

#CopperCrash #FalunMine #PlateMoney #GustavIIAdolf #SwedishEmpire #EarlyModernEconomy #MonetaryHistory #Inflation #Riksdag #SteelTrade #Bergslagen #Oxenstierna #DutchTrade #EconomicHistory #History #FexingoHistory #NorthernEurope #Podcast

Keep every episode free: buymeacoffee.com/fexingo