In the 1620s and 30s, people were purchasing tulip bulbs at higher and higher prices. Such a scheme lasted as long as someone was willing to pay such high prices and take possession of the bulbs. In February 1637, tulip traders could no longer find new buyers willing to pay increasingly inflated prices for their bulbs. The demand for tulips collapsed. Some had contracts to purchase tulips at prices now ten times greater than those on the open market, others owned bulbs now worth a fraction of the price they had paid.
The panicked tulip speculators sought help from the government of the Netherlands, which responded by declaring that anyone who had bought contracts to purchase bulbs in the future could void their contract by payment of a 10-percent fee. Ultimately, judges regarded the debts as contracted through gambling, and thus not enforceable by law.
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