Primordial Stock Exchange

Ung threw the mammoth hide over his shoulders and walked out of his cave. The fire from the night before had been reduced to glowing embers. A thin layer of frost had settled over most everything. Each breath remained suspended in the air for a moment.

The early morning sun had stirred many things to wake. Out on the plain below, Ung saw herds of early ungulates grazing. Ung grunted out to Oog, known the entire caveside over for his superior hunting skills. Oog grunted back. He gathered up a small party - it was Og, and Erg, and Pfft, and Un - and together they descended on the plain below and on the herds that grazed there.

Ung stared in amusement at the hunt party working. He had long ago forgone the work of the hunting party for a simpler career feeding off of the work of others.

Oog and his party returned at high noon with a large predecessor of the horse. They laid it down in front of Ung. Ung cut into the animal and removed the spleen. He pulled the small intestine out and coiled it around a stone. He split the stomach open and spilled its contents in a wide arc around the animal. Ung looked his work over. He studied it from leftways and sideways, Upside and down. Finally, he grunted in excitement. He ran into his cave and began madly drawing wild lines. Ung took a step back. He was pleased with what he saw, pleased because he knew that he was about to make loads upon loads of pebbles and shells.

The news that Ung's wall bore spread like wildfire across the cavescape. The savviest of the cave dwellers hedged their bets on Ung's predictions, artificially inflating the valuation on the cave market. More ans more threw all their pebbles in the game hoping for a solid return. The caving market grew larger and larger. Soon, cave lenders were handing out sub-prime mortgages to anyone and everyone. They all looked to turn their fortunes into something greater and greater.

Suddenly, without any clear warning, an unexpected drought withered away the prime foraging habitat. This was coupled with a burst in the caving bubble. Those that depended on quality forage could no longer afford their caves. One by one, caves were foreclosed upon. The caving market crumbled. Thousands upon thousands lost their caves and forced out into the viscous world. Without shelter to run to, those that were without home were quickly devoured by the predators that waited.

For the most part Ung and those quite like him were well insulated from the burst of the bubble. They made their thousands of pebbles and shells and were basking in their good fortune. Weeks later, the 1% learned to face the reality that they could not go forever on with pebbles and shells. As nice as they were to have, they lacked the sustenance that nuts, berries, or meat had. Those 1%er's needed to find some way to get sustenance into their bodies. Years of life in the Paleolithic banking world had left them quite ill-prepared for the dangers of the real world. Without the skills necessary, they too fell victim to the jaws of hungry predators.

And that, as they say, is that. The truly remarkable story about how the earliest stock market destroyed the human race forever more.