It sounds like the start of a parable: Investors stuck inside during a pandemic begin to bid up an asset until its price becomes untethered to reality. The value soars until one day the market runs out of buyers and freezes, causing prices to plummet and some unlucky few to lose fortunes more than ten times their annual incomes in the span of a few hours.
The date: Feb. 3, 1636. On that day, the infamous Dutch tulip bubble burst during an outbreak of the bubonic plague, illustrating that asset prices can plummet just as quickly as they soar, leaving only pain behind.
Now, almost exactly 385 years and another pandemic later, Wall Street waits to see how long it will take for history to repeat itself.