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Founded in 1602, the Dutch East India Company (VOC) combined investment, shipping, military power and colonial trade to become one of history's first global corporations.

Dutch Republic, 1602

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The story behind the card

The Dutch parliament, the States General, gave the VOC a 21-year monopoly on Dutch trade east of the Cape of Good Hope, along with powers normally held by states: it could build forts, keep an army, wage war, sign treaties and mint coins. To raise money it sold shares to the public, and trading in those shares in Amsterdam made it one of the first companies with freely traded stock. From its Asian headquarters at Batavia, today's Jakarta, it dominated the spice trade, often by force: in 1621 its troops killed or expelled most of the people of the Banda Islands to control nutmeg. At its height it employed tens of thousands of people. Debt and corruption brought it down, and it was dissolved in 1799.

Türkçe oku
1602'de kurulan Hollanda Doğu Hindistan Şirketi (VOC), yatırımı, deniz taşımacılığını, askerî gücü ve sömürge ticaretini bir araya getirerek tarihin ilk küresel şirketlerinden biri oldu.
Hollanda Cumhuriyeti, 1602

Hollanda Genel Meclisi, VOC'ye Ümit Burnu'nun doğusundaki Hollanda ticaretinde 21 yıllık bir tekel verdi. Bununla da kalmadı, normalde yalnızca devletlerin sahip olduğu yetkileri de tanıdı: Şirket kale kurabiliyor, ordu besleyebiliyor, savaş açabiliyor, antlaşma imzalayabiliyor ve para basabiliyordu. Sermaye toplamak için halka hisse sattı; bu hisselerin Amsterdam'da alınıp satılması, onu hisseleri serbestçe el değiştiren ilk şirketlerden biri yaptı. Asya'daki merkezi Batavia'dan, yani bugünkü Cakarta'dan baharat ticaretine hâkim oldu ve bunu çoğu zaman zor kullanarak yaptı: 1621'de muskat ticaretini ele geçirmek için Banda Adaları halkının büyük bölümünü öldürdü ya da sürdü. En güçlü döneminde on binlerce kişi çalıştırıyordu. Borçlar ve yolsuzluk şirketin sonunu getirdi; VOC 1799'da feshedildi.

Sources and further reading

Background reading: Dutch East India Company
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