Treasury Secretary William Gibbs McAdoo closes the New York Stock Exchange to stop the European liquidation of American securities caused by the outbreak of WWI. After several days of selloffs, about $3 billion (equivalent to $90 billion in 2023) of foreign portfolio investments had been sold.
All of the world’s financial markets also closed. The Sock market remained closed for four months opening again on December 12, 1914. Bond trading had restarted on November 28, 1914. The liquidation of European-held securities transformed the United States from a debtor nation to a creditor nation for the first time in its history. More
