Dutch East India Company Founded

The United East India Company, commonly known as the Dutch East India Company, was a chartered trading company and one of the first joint-stock companies in the world.^¹ Established on 20 March 1602 by the States General of the Netherlands amalgamating existing companies, it was granted a 21-year monopoly to carry out trade activities in Asia.^¹ Shares in the company could be purchased by any citizen of the Dutch Republic and bought and sold in open-air secondary markets, one of which became the Amsterdam Stock Exchange.^¹ The company possessed quasi-governmental powers, including the ability to wage war, imprison and execute convicts, negotiate treaties, strike its own coins, and establish colonies.^¹ Because it traded across multiple colonies and countries from both the East and the West, the VOC is sometimes considered to have been the world's first multinational corporation.^¹