The Salad Oil Swindle of 1963: The Paper Said the Oil Was There
A tank farm in New Jersey, a great deal of vegetable oil that wasn't there, and a pile of paper that said it was. After it came apart in November 1963, a later appeals court put what was found at about $6 million worth of vegetable oil, along with salt water, against $100 million in warehouse receipts issued to Allied.
Nearly all of this story is paper saying something is there, and people lending a lot of money because of that paper. That's still how a lot of money works: a bank statement, a company that says its warehouses are full. Arthur and George follow the warehouse receipts through…
The skinny
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